Nanocarriers and Cancer Therapy: Approaches to Topical and Transdermal Delivery

Abstract

The main goals of nanotechnology in cancer are to develop safer and more effective diagnostics and therapeutics. Nanotechnology can bring advantages to drug delivery, overcoming the limitations of conventional formulations. Drugs encapsulated in targeted nanocarriers are promising for the improvement of efficacy and safety of not only currently available drugs, but also certain chemical or biological compounds that were not previously used due to toxic effects or because they were not able to be administered. Drug delivery across the skin is an extremely attractive route due to the possibility of targeting skin diseases (topical), for achieving systemic effects (transdermal administration), providing patient convenience, and avoiding first-pass hepatic metabolism. However, this route still remains a challenge due the highly organised stratum corneum structure. Several strategies have been studied to optimize topical and transdermal drug delivery, including physical techniques, such as eletroporation and iontophoresis, and nanotechnology-based drug delivery systems. This work discusses nanotechnol-ogy evolution and the use of several nanotechnology strategies to increase skin penetration and permeation in the improvement of cancer treatment. 14.1 Nanotechnology in Healthcare: Evolution Recently, the term nanotechnology has become popular and has shown current trends in science and technology. The term nanotechnology refers not to a specific area, but to a variety of disciplines ranging from the basic science of materials to applications in healthcare. Nanotechnology has contributed greatly to biology, biotechnology, electrical engineering, mechanics, chemistry, materials, mathematics , and chemistry, among many other fields [1]. Nanotechnology is now a major focus of research activities, development and innovation in all industrialised countries. In 2000, a government agency was created in the U.S., the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI), which was responsible for financing the research and development, infrastructure, education and commercialisation of nanotechnology. In 2005, the resources invested were