Active targeting with particulate drug carriers in tumor therapy: fundamentals and recent progress

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Nanotechnology
• Pharmacology

Background:

• Drug therapy for tumors faces limitations due to narrow therapeutic indices.
• Particulate drug carriers offer a promising strategy to overcome these limitations through active targeting.
• These carriers possess high drug loading capacity and protect drugs from degradation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To review the advancements in actively targeted particulate drug carriers for tumor treatment.
• To highlight the key strategies and findings demonstrating their therapeutic efficacy.
• To discuss the future potential of improved targeting ligands.

Main Methods:

• Review of recent scientific literature on particulate drug carriers and tumor targeting.
• Analysis of studies demonstrating therapeutic efficacy in animal models.
• Examination of clinical trial progress for actively targeted carriers.

Main Results:

• Active targeting of tumors with particulate carriers, using ligands, enhances drug delivery specificity.
• Internalizing ligands and targeting tumor vasculature have been crucial for demonstrating efficacy in vivo.
• Several actively targeted particulate carriers are now in clinical investigation.

Conclusions:

• Actively targeted particulate drug carriers show significant promise for improved cancer therapy.
• Ongoing research into novel targeting ligands, like cell-penetrating peptides, is expected to further enhance efficacy.
• These advanced drug delivery systems are transitioning from preclinical to clinical applications.