Understanding the Pharmaceutical Aspects of Dendrimers for the Delivery of Anticancer Drugs

Abstract

Dendrimers are emerging class of nanoparticles used in targeted drug delivery systems. These are radially symmetric molecules with well-defined, homogeneous, and monodisperse structures. Due to the nano size, they can easily cross the biological membrane and increase bioavailability. The surface functionalization facilitates targeting of the particular site of action, assists the high drug loading and improves the therapeutic efficiency of the drug. These properties make dendrimers advantageous over conventional drug delivery systems. This article explains the features of dendrimers along with their method of synthesis, such as divergent growth method, convergent growth method, double exponential and mixed method, hyper-core and branched method. Dendrimers are effectively used in anticancer delivery and can be targeted at the site of tumor either by active or passive targeting. There are three mechanisms by which drugs interact with dendrimers, and they are physical encapsulation, electrostatic interaction, chemical conjugation of drug molecules. Drug releases from dendrimer either by in vivo cleavage of the covalent bond between drugdendrimer complexes or by physical changes or stimulus like pH, temperature, etc.

Recent Advances in Targeted Nanocarriers for the Management of Triple Negative Breast Cancer

“…Dendrimers are synthetic, three-dimensional, highly branched macromolecules having one of the dimensions in nanometers. Dendrimers comprise a central core and various functionalities at the periphery [ 143 ]. In a detailed manner, the dendrimer has three different parts, namely, a focal core, and building blocks which are repeated units of dendrimers and has multiple functional groups at the peripheral end [ 144 ].…”

Developments in Treatment Methodologies Using Dendrimers for Infectious Diseases

“…The advantage of using dendrimers as a vaccine against coronaviruses is that their structures provide high density of surface modifiable functional groups. They have low immunogenicity and a large number of positive charges on the surface that can be used to complex RNA or DNA [ 41 , 102 ]. On the other hand, enzymatic biodegradation of the dendrimers may be hindered due to steric factors and consequently lead to toxicity related to the accumulation of these materials in tissue [ 101 ].…”

Influence of the Chemical Structure on the Mechanical Relaxation of Dendrimers

“…Therefore, the optimization of synthesis methods and the development of new strategies, that allow the creation of dendrimers with different morphology and functionalization, contribute to the emergence of new types of dendrimers [ 8 , 9 , 10 ]. The behavior of dendrimers in solution remains the most studied due to their use in biomedical applications [ 11 , 12 , 13 ] as nanocontainers for gene and drug delivery [ 14 , 15 , 16 ]. New developments are underway to create novel materials based on dendrimer macromolecules and to use dendrimers as nanomodifiers for already utilized materials [ 17 , 18 ].…”