 The self-assembly method has advantages in the fact that it forms a more natural binding site, and also offers additional flexibility in the types of monomers that can be polymerized.The covalent method has its advantages in generally offering a high yield of homogeneous binding sites, but first requires the synthesis of a derivatized imprint molecule and may not imitate the "natural" conditions that could be present elsewhere.Over the recent years, interest in the technique of molecular imprinting has increased rapidly, both in the academic community and in the industry.