| The quality analysis of water, pharmaceutical and environmental compounds is a basic subject for human
health. The presence of low-quality drugs, biological toxins and chemical compounds in water or
forbidden additives in the nourishments lead to irreversible problems in human health. Hence, multiple
analytical approaches have been presented for investigating the quality of environmental, pharmaceutical, and food compounds and monitoring the detection of toxic compounds and pollutants in water.
Sensing tools based on analytical strategies are required for identifying and quantifying the different
pollutants including biological and chemical contaminants in water samples. Among different biosensing
and sensing tools, portable sensing assays are of special importance because of their great advantages
such as simplicity, affordability, portability and ability to on-site detection. Therefore, during the last
decades, designing and fabricating portable assays with great sensitivity and selectivity have been
considered by many researchers and scientists for detection of various water pollutants. In this paper, the
latest improvements in portable biosensors and sensors in the monitoring of biological and chemical
pollutants in different samples of water are extensively explained. Initially, different portable sensing
assays and novel technologies in their development are addressed. Then, by introducing various biological (bacteria, algae, toxins) and chemical pollutants (heavy metals, aromatic compounds, pesticides
and insecticides), different portable sensors which have been developed for the detection of the pollutants are presented. Finally, upcoming perspectives and future challenges are thoroughly described |