Inflammation‐modulating nanoparticles for pneumonia therapy

Abstract

Pneumonia is a common but serious infectious disease, and is the sixth leading cause for death. The foreign pathogens such as viruses, fungi, and bacteria establish an inflammation response after interaction with lung, leading to the filling of bronchioles and alveoli with fluids. Although the pharmacotherapies have shown their great effectiveness to combat pathogens, advanced methods are under developing to treat complicated cases such as virus‐infection and lung inflammation or acute lung injury (ALI). The inflammation modulation nanoparticles (NPs) can effectively suppress immune cells and inhibit inflammatory molecules in the lung site, and thereby alleviate pneumonia and ALI. In this review, the pathological inflammatory microenvironments in pneumonia, which are instructive for the design of biomaterials therapy, are summarized. The focus is then paid to the inflammation‐modulating NPs that modulate the inflammatory cells, cytokines and chemokines, and microenvironments of pneumonia for better therapeutic effects. This article is categorized under: Therapeutic Approaches and Drug Discovery > Nanomedicine for Respiratory Disease

ROS-responsive polymer nanoparticles with enhanced loading of dexamethasone effectively modulate the lung injury microenvironment

“…Macrophages are thought to be important in the progression of ALI. Macrophages in the alveoli are the first defenders activated by infection, and thus play a key role in the initiation and maintenance of inflammatory response [5] . Here, RAW264.7 cells were used to mimic alveolar macrophages, whose viability was examined after incubation with various concentrations of DEX and NPs.…”

“…Therefore, the inhalation of medicines contained in a polymeric matrix has been extensively studied as a potential method of overcoming the short residence time and low lung drug concentration [50] . The benefits of employing nanotechnology for drug administration via inhalation route include targeted drug delivery, higher effectiveness, lower toxicity, reduced biodistribution, enhanced bioavailability and improved patient comfort [ 5 , 51 ]. Modeling and drug administration were improved by endotracheal intubation atomization (Fig.…”

“…The acute lung injury (ALI) is a life-threatening inflammatory disorder associated with cytokine storm syndrome, excessive levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines such as interleukins (IL), tumor necrosis factors (TNF), and interferons (IFN), and can easily be developed into acute distress syndrome (ARDS) if left untreated 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 . The release of pro-inflammatory cytokines elicits an immune response and recruits neutrophils to the inflamed tissue, which further release noxious mediators such as reactive oxygen species (ROS) and myeloperoxidase (MPO) [5] . ROS are presumed to serve as a host defense against pathogens, and their concentration is thought to be controlled by the balance between production and scavenging [6] .…”

“…A range of ROS-responsive materials, such as scaffolds, hydrogels, and nanoparticles (NPs), have recently been settled to respond to physiological oxidative microenvironments [ 16 , 17 ]. To specifically target inflamed lung tissues, ROS-responsive NPs have been developed to deliver therapeutic drugs that modulate the ALI microenvironment [ 5 , 18 , 19 ]. For example, a ROS-responsive material 4-(hydroxymethyl phenylboronic acid pinacol ester)-modified cyclodextrin was employed as a carrier to encapsulate moxifloxacin to create a core-shell NPs, whose surface was further coated with 2-distearoyl-sn-glycer-3-pho-sphoethanolamine-polyethylene glycol folic acid [20] .…”

Emerging strategies in nanotechnology to treat respiratory tract infections: realizing current trends for future clinical perspectives

“…Certain viruses, i.e. coronavirus, adenoviruses, influenza virus, and respiratory syncytial viruses are also responsible for the spread of viral pneumonia (Muhammad et al., 2022 ). The therapy is initiated after the conformation of an etiological agent and the severity of the disease then the treatment starts in a rational way to treat the development of these resistant strains.…”