Editorial: Anti-cancer drug delivery: lipid-based nanoparticles

Abstract

Cancer continues to pose significant challenges that require extensive attention and efforts from the scientific community. The battle against cancer encompasses the development of effective and safe therapeutic approaches. However, achieving this balance is highly complex for anticancer therapies, as they often exhibit intense intrinsic cytotoxicity, affecting both cancerous and healthy cells and resulting in substantial toxicity that limits their clinical utility. A promising strategy to address this challenge involves the selective guidance of therapeutic agents to the cancer site, minimizing off-target effects. Nanotechnology offers powerful tools to engineer smart and targeted therapeutics that preferentially accumulate in cancerous tissues . This preferential localization is achieved through the Enhanced Permeation and Retention (EPR) effect, first reported by Prof. Hiroshi Maeda in 1984 . The EPR effect leverages the leaky vasculature in tumor regions, enabling enhanced infiltration of nanotherapeutics and localizing their therapeutic effects, which is commonly described as "passive targeting ". On the other hand, nanotechnologists may also employ "active targeting" by modifying nanoparticle surfaces with homing ligands that selectively recognize cancer cells . Both passive and active targeting strategies are keys for success of nanoparticle-based drug delivery systems, and serve as a justification for the development of nanotherapeutics. Extensive literature exists on various types of nanoparticles and nanomaterials with potential applications as drug delivery systems.