Relationship among reaction rate, release rate and efficiency of nanomachine-based targeted drug delivery

In nanomachine applications towards targeted drug delivery, drug molecules released by nanomachines propagate and chemically react with tumor cells in aqueous environment. If the nanomachines release drug molecules faster than the tumor cells react, it will result in loss and waste of drug molecules. It is a potential issue associated with the relationship among reaction rate, release rate and efficiency.

This paper aims to investigate the relationship among reaction rate, release rate and efficiency based on two drug reception models. We expect to pave a way for designing a control method of drug release.

We adopted two analytical methods that one is drug reception process based on collision with tumors and another is based on Michaelis Menten enzymatic kinetics. To evaluate the analytical formulations, we used the well-known simulation framework N3Sim to establish simulations.

The analytical results of the relationship among reaction rate, release rate and efficiency is obtained, which match well with the numerical simulation results in a 3-D environment.

Based upon two drug reception models, the results of this paper would be beneficial for designing a control method of nanomahine-based drug release.