Targeted Nanosystems to Prostate Cancer

Prostate cancer remains an increasingly common malignancy worldwide. Many advances in drug development have been achieved for the conventional treatments; however, chemotherapeutic agents are distributed nonspecifically in the body where they affect both prostate cancer and healthy cells. Limited dose achievable within the prostate tumor and suboptimal treatment due to excessive toxicities reveal the importance of the development of more specific mechanisms and ways of drug targeting to prostate tumor. In this context, nanotechnology, molecular biology and biochemistry have been applied in the pharmaceutical area for development of new targeted drug delivery nanosystems in order to improve its pharmacokinetic profile, raise the effectiveness of treatment; reduce side effects due to the preferential accumulation in prostate cancer cells, causing low concentrations in healthy tissues; and/or increase the drug chemical stability for improving the prostate cancer therapeutic. Thus, in this review, we will discuss the molecular and biochemical basis of prostate cancer as well as the advantages and disadvantages of conventional clinical treatments, different types and basic characteristics of nanosystems; how these systems can be targeted to prostate cancer, show successful patent examples of prostate cancer targeted nanosystems and present perspectives for the next 10-20 years in this area.