A review: Development and application of surface molecularly imprinted polymers toward amino acids, peptides, and proteins

Molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) have received wide interests in the bioanalysis field as "artificial antibodies". They can mimic biological receptors by selectively recognizing and adsorbing target molecules owing to their specific affinity to the targets. Traditional MIPs obtained by bulk imprinting have some defects, including low adsorption capacity, poor site accessibility, restricted mass transfer, and irregular morphology, which limit their development. Surface molecularly imprinted polymers (SMIPs) show the features of large surface area, allow fast mass transfer, and have high adsorption capacity and efficiency. They have been intensively used in the research of amino acids, peptides, and proteins due to these advantages. In this review, we systematically summarize the preparation of SMIPs including components and polymerization strategies, and their applications focusing on amino acids, peptides, and proteins are discussed in detail. Finally, future trends and challenges for the design and development of SMIPs are described.