Nanoparticles Incorporating a Fluorescence Turn-on Reporter for Real-Time Drug Release Monitoring, a Chemoenhancer and a Stealth Agent: Poseidon's Trident against Cancer?

The rate and extent of drug release under physiological conditions is a key factor influencing the therapeutic activity of a formulation. Real-time detection of drug release by conventional pharmacokinetics approaches is confounded by low sensitivity, particularly in the case of tissue-targeted novel drug delivery systems, where low concentrations of the drug reach systemic circulation. We present a novel fluorescence turn-on platform for real-time monitoring of drug release from nanoparticles based on reversible fluorescence quenching in fluorescein esters.