Colloidal drug delivery systems in vaccine delivery.

Vaccines play a vital role in the field of community medicine to combat against several diseases of human existence. Vaccines primarily trigger the acquired immune system to develop long-lasting immunity against pathogens. Conventional approaches for vaccine delivery lacks potential to target a particular antigen to develop acquired immunity by specific antibodies. Recent advancements in vaccine delivery showed that inclusion of adjuvants in vaccine formulations or delivery of them in a carrier helps in achieving desired targeting ability, reducing the immunogenicity and significant augmentation in the immune response. Colloidal carriers (liposomes, niosomes, microspheres, proteosomes, virosomes and virus like particles (VLPs), antigen cochleates, dendrimers and carbon nanotubes) have been widely explored for vaccine delivery. Further, surface engineering of these carriers with ligands, functional moieties and monoclonal antibodies tend to enhance the immune recognition potential of vaccines by differentiation of antigen specific memory T-cells. The current review, therefore, provides an updated account on the recent advancements in various colloidal delivery systems in vaccine delivery, outlining the mechanism of immune response initiated by them along with potential applications and marketed instances in an explicit manner.