What is it about?
The study of nanostructured drug delivery systems allows the development of novel platforms for the efficient transport and controlled release of drug molecules in the harsh microenvironment of diseased tissues of living systems, thus offering a wide range of functional nanoplatforms for smart application in biotechnology and nanomedicine. This article highlights recent advances of smart nanocarriers composed of organic (including polymeric micelles and vesicles, liposomes, dendrimers, and hydrogels) and inorganic (including quantum dots, gold and mesoporous silica nanoparticles) materials.
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Why is it important?
Despite the remarkable developments of recent synthetic methodologies, most of all nanocarriers’ action is associated with a number of unwanted side effects that diminish their efficient use in biotechnology and nanomedicine applications. This highlights some critical issues in the design and engineering of nanocarrier systems for biotechnology applications, arising from the complex environment and multiform interactions established within the specific biological media.
Perspectives
a deeper knowledge and understanding of the real interactions involved in the diseased tissues is fundamental for the development of novel therapeutic protocols based on the employment of smart nanocarriers. The difficulty to predict the behavior (and responses) of nanocarriers during the drug delivery processes is connected with the difficulty to fully describe (and model) the complex structural and dynamic processes involved in biological systems. In this respect, the investigation of a multiplicity of simultaneous factors and biological functionality may be replaced with the systematic study of the effect of a few parameters at a time (such as surface charge density and/or nanoparticle size/topology). The identification of the key factors for the design of efficient nanocarriers represents then the fundamental (initial) step to decipher the complexity involved in complex biological processes. Therefore, a deeper knowledge and understanding of the real interactions involved in the diseased tissues is fundamental for the development of novel therapeutic approaches and protocols based on the employment of smart nanocarriers.
Domenico Lombardo
CNR Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Istituto per i Processi Chimico-Fisici
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Smart Nanoparticles for Drug Delivery Application: Development of Versatile Nanocarrier Platforms in Biotechnology and Nanomedicine, Journal of Nanomaterials, February 2019, Hindawi Publishing Corporation,
DOI: 10.1155/2019/3702518.
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