Dual anticancer drug delivery of D-galactose-functionalized stimuli-responsive nanogels for targeted therapy of the liver hepatocellular carcinoma

Advances in Cyclodextrins and Their Derivatives in Nano-Delivery Systems

The diversity of cyclodextrins and their derivatives is increasing with continuous research. In addition to monomolecular cyclodextrins with different branched chains, cyclodextrin-based polymers have emerged. The aim of this review is to summarize these innovations, with a special focus on the study of applications of cyclodextrins and their derivatives in nano-delivery systems. The areas covered include nanospheres, nano-sponges, nanogels, cyclodextrin metal-organic frameworks, liposomes, and emulsions, providing a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of the design and development of nano-delivery systems.

Nanogels: Recent Advances in Synthesis and Biomedical Applications

In the context of advanced nanomaterials research, nanogels (NGs) have recently gained broad attention for their versatility and promising biomedical applications. To date, a significant number of NGs have been developed to meet the growing demands in various fields of biomedical research. Summarizing preparation methods, physicochemical and biological properties, and recent applications of NGs may be useful to help explore new directions for their development. This article presents a comprehensive overview of the latest NG synthesis methodologies, highlighting advances in formulation with different types of hydrophilic or amphiphilic polymers. It also underlines recent biomedical applications of NGs in drug delivery and imaging, with a short section dedicated to biosafety considerations of these innovative nanomaterials. In conclusion, this article summarizes recent innovations in NG synthesis and their numerous applications, highlighting their considerable potential in the biomedical field.

Multifunctionality of cyclodextrin-based polymeric nanoparticulate delivery systems for chemotherapeutics, combination therapy, and theranostics

As cancer being the most difficult disease to treat, different kinds of medications and therapeutic approaches have been prominently developed by scientists. For certain families of drugs, such as immuno-therapeutics or antibody-drug conjugates, efficient delivery systems are required during administration to protect the drugs from chemical degradation or biological inactivation. Delivery systems with the ability to carry different therapeutics or diagnostic agents or both, hold promising potential to tackle the abnormalities behind cancer. In this context, this review provides updated insights on how cyclodextrin-based polymeric nanosystems have become an effective treatment approach against cancer. Cyclodextrins (CDs) are natural oligosaccharides that are famously exploited in pharmaceutical research due to their exceptional quality of entrapping water-insoluble molecules inside their hydrophobic core and providing enhanced solubility with the help of their hydrophilic exterior. Combining the properties of CDs with polymeric nanoparticles (PNPs) brings out excellent versatile and tunable profiles, thanks to the submicron-sized PNPs. By introducing the significance of CD as a delivery system, a collective discussion on different binding approaches and release mechanisms of CD-drug complexation, followed by their characterization studies has been done in this review. Further, in light of recent studies, the article majorly focuses on conveying how promoting CD to a polymeric and nanoscale elevates the multifunctional advantages against cancer that can be successfully applied in combination therapy and theranostics. Moreover, CD-based delivery systems including CALAA-01, CRLX101, and CRLX301, have demonstrated improved tumor targeting, reduced side effects, and prolonged drug release in preclinical studies and clinical trials.

Recent advances in stimuli-responsive tailored nanogels for cancer therapy; from bench to personalized treatment

To improve the quality of health in a personalized manner, better control over pharmacologically relevant cargo formulation, organ-specific targeted delivery, and on-demand release of therapeutic agents is crucial. Significant work has been put into designing and developing revolutionary nanotherapeutics approaches for the effective monitoring and personalized treatment of disease. Nanogel (NG) has attracted significant interest because of its tremendous potential in cancer therapy and its environmental stimuli responsiveness. NG is considered a next-generation delivery technology due to its benefits like as size tunability, high loading, stimuli responsiveness, prolonged drug release via in situ gelling mechanisms, stability, and its potential to provide personalized therapy from the investigation of human genes and the genes in various types of cancers and its association with a selective anticancer drug. Stimuli-responsive NGs can be used as smart nanomedicines to detect and treat cancer and can be tuned as personalized medicine as well. This comprehensive review article's major objectives include the challenges of NGs' clinical translation for cancer treatment as well as its early preclinical successes and prospects.

Stimuli-Responsive and Multifunctional Nanogels in Drug Delivery

Nanogels represent promising drug delivery systems in the biomedical field, designed to overcome challenges associated with standard treatment approaches. Stimuli-responsive nanogels, often referred to as intelligent materials, have garnered significant attention for their potential to enhance control over properties such as drug release and targeting. Furthermore, researchers have recently explored the application of nanogels in diverse sectors beyond biomedicine including sensing materials, catalysts, or adsorbents for environmental applications. However, to fully harness their potential as practical delivery systems, further research is required to better understand their pharmacokinetic behaviour, interactions between nanogels and bio distributions, as well as toxicities. One promising future application of stimuli-responsive multifunctional nanogels is their use as delivery agents in cancer treatment, offering an alternative to overcome the challenges with conventional approaches. This review discusses various synthetic methods employed in developing nanogels as efficient carriers for drug delivery in cancer treatment. The investigations explore, the key aspects of nanogels, including their multifunctionality and stimuli-responsive properties, as well as associated toxicity concerns. The discussions presented herein aim to provide the readers a comprehensive understanding of the potential of nanogels as smart drug delivery systems in the context of cancer therapy.

Review of the Application of Dual Drug Delivery Nanotheranostic Agents in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Liver Cancer

Liver cancer has high incidence and mortality rates and its treatment generally requires the use of a combination treatment strategy. Therefore, the early detection and diagnosis of liver cancer is crucial to achieving the best treatment effect. In addition, it is imperative to explore multimodal combination therapy for liver cancer treatment and the synergistic effect of two liver cancer treatment drugs while preventing drug resistance and drug side effects to maximize the achievable therapeutic effect. Gold nanoparticles are used widely in applications related to optical imaging, CT imaging, MRI imaging, biomarkers, targeted drug therapy, etc., and serve as an advanced platform for integrated application in the nano-diagnosis and treatment of diseases. Dual-drug-delivery nano-diagnostic and therapeutic agents have drawn great interest in current times. Therefore, the present report aims to review the effectiveness of dual-drug-delivery nano-diagnostic and therapeutic agents in the field of anti-tumor therapy from the particular perspective of liver cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Revolutionizing fuel production through biologically synthesized zero-dimensional nanoparticles

The sustainable management of wastewater and the production of clean fuel with a reduced carbon footprint require innovative methods, including photocatalytic degradation of pollutants and hydrogen generation. To achieve this, biosynthesized photocatalysts are necessary, with carbon quantum dots (CQDs) being a promising candidate for achieving this goal. In this study, CQDs were prepared from water caltrop peels and a composite of greenly synthesized CQDs with copper selenide (CuSe) was used for the photocatalytic degradation of pollutants and production of fuel. Thymol blue (TB) and Congo red (CR) were chosen as model dyes for degradation studies, with optimized reaction conditions being determined by varying the dose, pH, intensity, and concentration of dyes. The composite (CuSe@CQDs) showed a degradation rate of 99.4% and 97.8% for TB and CR, respectively, within 60 minutes, with a corresponding hydrogen production rate of 2360 and 1875 μmol g-1 h-1. The yield of hydrogen production using the composite was 35.7 and 29 times greater than that of CuSe alone for TB and CR, respectively. Spectroscopic techniques such as XRD, UV-Vis, FESEM, HRTEM, XPS, FTIR, BET, and TGA were used to characterize the composite, and the results revealed that the composite had superior degradation rates compared to CuSe alone, with the degradation rate being enhanced by about three times. GCMS analysis was used to investigate the intermediate and possible degradation pathways. Overall, this study highlights the potential of biosynthesized CQDs as effective photocatalysts for the sustainable management of wastewater and production of fuel.

Super-Macroporous Pulluan Cryogels as Controlled Active Delivery Systems with Controlled Degradability

Here, super-macroporous cryogel from a natural polysaccharide, pullulan was synthesized using a cryo-crosslinking technique with divinyl sulfone (DVS) as a crosslinker. The hydrolytic degradation of the pullulan cryogel in various simulated body fluids (pH 1.0, 7.4, and 9.0 buffer solutions) was evaluated. It was observed that the pullulan cryogel degradation was much faster in the pH 9 buffer solution than the pH 1.0 and 7.4 buffer solutions in the same time period. The weight loss of the pullulan cryogel at pH 9.0 within 28 days was determined as 31% ± 2%. To demonstrate the controllable drug delivery potential of pullulan cryogels via degradation, an antibiotic, ciprofloxacin, was loaded into pullulan cryogels (pullulan-cipro), and the loading amount of drug was calculated as 105.40 ± 2.6 µg/mg. The release of ciprofloxacin from the pullulan-cipro cryogel was investigated in vitro at 37.5 °C in physiological conditions (pH 7.4). The amount of drug released within 24 h was determined as 39.26 ± 3.78 µg/mg, which is equal to 41.38% ± 3.58% of the loaded drug. Only 0.1 mg of pullulan-cipro cryogel was found to inhibit half of the growing Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) colonies for 10 min and totally eradicated within 2 h by the release of the loaded antibiotic. No significant toxicity was determined on L929 fibroblast cells for 0.1 mg drug-loaded pullulan cryogel. In contrast, even 1 mg of drug-loaded pullulan cryogel revealed slight toxicity (e.g., 66% ± 9% cell viability) because of the high concentration of released drug.

Nanogels for bone tissue engineering - from synthesis to application

Nanogels are cross-linked hydrogel nanoparticles with a three-dimensional, tunable porous structure that merges the best features of hydrogels and nanoparticles, including the ability to retain their hydrated nature and to swell and shrink in response to environmental changes. Nanogels have attracted increasing attention for use in bone tissue engineering as scaffolds for growth factor transport and cell adhesion. Their three-dimensional structures allow the encapsulation of a wide range of hydrophobic and hydrophilic drugs, enhance their half-life, and impede their enzymatic breakdown in vivo. Nanogel-based scaffolds are a viable treatment modality for enhanced bone regeneration. They act as carriers for cells and active ingredients capable of controlled release, enhanced mechanical support, and osteogenesis for enhanced bone tissue regeneration. However, the development of such nanogel constructs might involve combinations of several biomaterials to fabricate active ingredients that can control release, enhance mechanical support, and facilitate osteogenesis for more effective bone tissue regeneration. Hence, this review aims to highlight the potential of nanogel-based scaffolds to address the needs of bone tissue engineering.

Characterization and drug delivery characters of nanocomposite hydrogels based on gamma-radiation copolymerization of poly (vinyl pyrrolidone) (PVP)/sodium alginate (AG)/silver NPs

Nanocomposite hydrogels were prepared by gamma-radiation copolymerization of poly (vinyl pyrrolidone) (PVP)/sodium alginate (AG) in the presence of silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs). The effect of irradiation dose and Ag NPs content on the gel content and swelling characters of PVP/AG/Ag NPs copolymers was investigated. In addition, the structure-property behavior of the copolymers was characterized by IR spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and x-ray diffraction (XRD). The drug uptake-release characters of PVP/AG/silver NPs copolymers, taking Prednisolone as a model drug, were studied. The study showed that the appropriate dose of gamma irradiation to achieve homogeneous nanocomposites hydrogel films and the highest swelling in water was 30 kGy, regardless of composition. The introduction of Ag NPs up to 5 wt % improved the physical properties and enhanced the drug uptake-release characters.

Development of the new pH-driven carrier from alginate/carboxymethyl starch bio-coated co-drugs@COF-OH for controlled and concomitant colon cancer treatment

To develop a new more efficient colon cancer treatment bio-vehicle, in frontier research, for the first time, an attempt has been made to design a unique colon-targeted bio-carrier containing polysaccharides along with nanoporous materials. So, at first, an imine-based covalent organic framework (COF-OH) with respectively an average pore diameter and surface area at 8.5058 nm and 208.29 m²·g^-1 was fabricated. In the next step, about 41.68 % and 95.8 % of 5-fluorouracil (5-Fu) and curcumin (CUR) respectively were loaded on COF-OH, and 5-Fu + CUR@COF-OH was achieved. Due to the higher rate of drug releases in simulated stomach media, 5-Fu + CUR@COF-OH was coated with a mixture of alginate (Alg) and carboxymethyl starch (CMS) via the ionic crosslinking (Alg/CMS@(5-Fu + CUR@COF-OH)). Findings displayed that the use of polysaccharide coat reduce the drug releases in simulated gastric and improved it in simulated intestinal and colonic fluids. The beads swelled about 93.33 % under simulated gastrointestinal conditions, but this value was found higher in the simulated colonic environment and reached 326.67 %. The hemolysis rate lower than 5 %, as well as the cell viability higher than 80 %, were the main showing signs of system biocompatibility. Altogether, the results of the preliminary investigations can highlight the potential of the Alg/CMS@(5-Fu + CUR@COF-OH) for colon-specific drug delivery.

In-vitro evaluation of the 5-fluorouracil loaded GQDs@Bio-MOF capped with starch biopolymer for improved colon-specific delivery

Herein, for the first time, the photoluminescent graphene quantum dots@Bio-metal organic framework (GQDs@Bio-MOF) nanohybrid was prepared. BET analysis obtained the average pore diameter of GQDs@Bio-MOF about 11.97 nm. The existence of nanoscale porosity in GQDs@Bio-MOF displays its suitability for 5-Fu loading owing to the smaller size of 5-Fu. 5-Fu entrapment efficiency and loading capacity were found to be ~42.04 % and ~4.20 %, respectively (5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF). The 5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF was capped with starch biopolymer (St@5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF), fabricated sample displayed 4.67 for pH_PZC. SEM analysis displayed that the St@5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF microspheres have a spherical shape with a diameter of ~2 μm. The in vitro drug release assay displayed better release behavior for St@5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF than 5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF, releasing about 62.3 % of the entrapped 5-Fu within 96 h of incubation. The 5-Fu release showed the best fitting with the Higuchi model with R² 0.9884. The in vitro cytotoxicity screening outcomes displayed that the St@GQDs@Bio-MOF is a promising biocompatible carrier, with cell viability of higher than 84 %. Accumulation of the results revealed that the St@5-Fu@GQDs@Bio-MOF is a new system with advantages of sustained drug release and biocompatibility that are the main criteria for each newly designed anticancer drug carrier.

D-mannose functionalized MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF nanocomposite as a new intelligent nanoplatform for MTX and DOX co-drug delivery

Commonly the directly administered chemotherapy drugs lack targeting in tumor treatment. Thus, trying to improve cancer treatment efficiency led us to design a new intelligent system for cancer treatment. Considering these, in the current work, at first, the 2-aminoterephthalic acid (NH₂-BDC) intercalated layered double hydroxides (MgAl-(NH₂-BDC) LDH) were synthesized simply. Afterward, the in situ growth of the iron-based metal-organic frameworks in the presence of MgAl-(NH₂-BDC) LDH occurred (MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF). In the end, the reaction of MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF with D-mannose (D-Man) achieved the MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF/D-Man ternary hybrid nanostructure. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis confirmed the formation of the monodisperse Fe-MOF with nanosize in the presence of MgAl-LDH. Importantly, methotrexate (MTX) and doxorubicin (DOX) entrapment efficiency reached respectively about 28 wt% and 21% for MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF/D-Man. The in vitro drug release experiments revealed a higher drug release at pH 5.0 in comparison with pH 7.4 which revealed its promising potential for anticancer drug delivery applications. Bioassay results revealed that the co-drug-loaded MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF/D-Man has higher cytotoxicity on MDA-MB 231 cells. At last, fluorescence microscopy and flow cytometric analysis confirmed the successful uptake of MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF/D-Man into MDA-MB 231 cell lines, as well as its bioimaging potential. A survey in the published literature approved that this work is the first report on the evaluation of the MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF/D-Man for targeted co-delivery of both MTX and DOX. Finally, results collectively demonstrate the importance of the biocompatible MgAl-LDH/Fe-MOF/D-Man as a hopeful candidate for biomedicinal applications from the targeted co-drug delivery and bioimaging potential viewpoints.

Recent Progress on Carbon Quantum Dots Based Photocatalysis

As a novel carbon allotrope, carbon quantum dots (CQDs) have been investigated in various fields, including photocatalysis, bioimaging, optoelectronics, energy and photovoltaic devices, biosensing, and drug delivery owing to their unique optical and electronic properties. In particular, CQDs' excellent sunlight harvesting ability, tunable photoluminescence (PL), up-conversion photoluminescence (UCPL), and efficient photo-excited electron transfer have enabled their applications in photocatalysis. This work focuses on the recent progress on CQDs-related materials' synthesis, properties, and applications in photocatalysis.