Developmental trend of immunoassays for monitoring hazards in food samples: A review

Abstract Background A gradual number of hazardous substances may exist in food, posing a threat to consumers health. Traditional immunoassays, such as enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA), lateral flow immunoassays (LFI), and chemiluminescence immunoassays (CLI) have been widely applied to analyze different hazards in food samples to ensure food safety. However, due to the low sensitivity and accuracy, the further application of traditional immunoassays was limited. Scope and approach In this review, the classification and potential harm of hazards in food were listed, while the principles and applications of ELISA, LFI, and CLI for the detection of different hazards in food samples were illustrated. Furthermore, to improve the detection performance, such as sensitivity and accuracy, we introduced the developmental trend of traditional immunoassays systematically. This review provided a comprehensive understanding of immunoassays for the detection of hazards in food samples. Key findings and conclusions Recent studies have utilized novel strategies to improve the performance of immunoassays. Typically, creating novel signal labels, and improving the support for signal labels, high-quality monoclonal antibody, specific recognition elements, heterologous detective antigen, and detection platform were comprehensively proposed. The future immunoassays should be ultrasensitive and multiple detection.