Albumin Nanostructures for Nucleic Acid Delivery in Cancer: Current Trend, Emerging Issues, and Possible Solutions.

Cancer is one of the major health problems worldwide, and hence, suitable therapies with enhanced efficacy and reduced side effects are desired. Gene therapy, involving plasmids, small interfering RNAs, and antisense oligonucleotides have been showing promising potential in cancer therapy. In recent years, the preparation of various carriers for nucleic acid delivery to the tumor sites is gaining attention since intracellular and extracellular barriers impart major challenges in the delivery of naked nucleic acids.

Albumin-Based Nanoparticles for the Delivery of Doxorubicin in Breast Cancer.

Albumin-based nanoparticles are an emerging platform for the delivery of various chemotherapeutics because of their biocompatibility, safety, and ease of surface modification for specific targeting. The most widely used method for the preparation of albumin nanoparticles is by desolvation process using glutaraldehyde (GLU) as a cross-linker. However, limitations of GLU like toxicity and interaction with drugs force the need for alternative cross-linkers.

Citrem-phosphatidylcholine nano-self-assemblies: solubilization of bupivacaine and its role in triggering a colloidal transition from vesicles to cubosomes and hexosomes.

Improvement of pain management strategies after arthroscopic surgery by multimodal analgesia may include the use of long-acting amide local anesthetics. Among these anesthetics, the low molecular weight local anesthetic agent bupivacaine (BUP) is attractive for use in postoperative pain management. However, it has a relatively short duration of action and imposes a higher risk of systemic toxicity at relatively large bolus doses.

pH-Responsive Nano-Self-Assemblies of the Anticancer Drug 2-Hydroxyoleic Acid.

pH-responsive lipid nanocarriers have the potential to selectively target the acidic extracellular pH environment of cancer tissues and may further improve the efficacy of chemotherapeutics by minimizing their toxic side-effects. Here, we present the design and characterization of pH-sensitive nano-self-assemblies of the poorly water-soluble anticancer drug 2-hydroxyoleic acid (2OHOA) with glycerol monooleate (GMO). pH-triggered nanostructural transformations from 2OHOA/GMO nanoparticles with an internal inverse hexagonal structure (hexosomes) at pH around 2.

Temperature triggering of kinetically trapped self-assemblies in citrem-phospholipid nanoparticles.

Lyotropic non-lamellar liquid crystalline (LLC) nanoparticles are attractive nanocarriers for drug delivery, particularly for the solubilization of poorly water-soluble drugs. Due to the reported problems of complement activation and cytotoxicity of most investigated Pluronic F127-stabilized cubosomes and hexosomes, there is an interest in introducing safe stabilizers for these LLC nanodispersions. Citrem appears to be the stabilizer of choice for the colloidal stabilization of these LLC nano-self-assemblies owing to its hemocompatiblity and poor activation of the complement system.