Electrochemical sensing of human hormones

Abstract

Harmones are vital components of human body since they regulate many biological functions. Therefore, their detection and monitoring is crucial since their imbalance can cause many diseases. Electrochemical sensing is widely used for the detection of human harmones. This review summarizes recent developments in electrochemical sensing for human hormones detection. The strengths and limitations of electrochemical sensing based techniques to detect hormones are discussed. Electrochemical immunosensing of hormones requires biorecognition elements such as antibodies and enzymes. These methods can monitor hormones in standard solutions and real biofluids i.e., serum, plasma, blood, saliva, sweat, and urine. Electrochemical sensors have been developed to many detect hormones such as thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH), thyroxine (T4), triiodothyronine (T3), parathyroid-hormone (PTH), cortisol, follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), luteinizing hormone (LH), progesterone (P4), testosterone, estriol (E3), melatonin, insulin, norepinephrine, and miscellaneous hormones. The sensing materials, sensing modalities, linearity, stability, limit of detection (LOD), and limit of quantification (LOQ) of fabricated sensors in hormone detection are described. The gaps, bottlenecks, and necessary initiatives in hormone detection are highlighted.