Abstract: Phenylboronic acid and its derivatives are known to form reversible complexes with polyol compounds，including sacccharides，glycolipids，glycoproteins，nucleotides etc，and consequently they have been widely used for recognition，separation and detection of those compounds. The applications of phenylboroinc acid and its derivatives in the fields of self-regulated insulin delivery，tissue engineering，separation and sensor systems are reviewed. Their further developments in pharmaceutical and chemical engineering are presented.