Polymersomes as an effective drug delivery system for glioma – a review

Abstract

Glioma is one of the most commonly occurring malignant brain tumours which need proper treatment strategy. The current therapies for treating glioma like surgical resection, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy have failed in achieving satisfactory results and this forms a rationale for the development of novel drug delivery systems. Among them, polymersomes are superior novel carriers with diverse functions like enhanced stability, low permeability, tunable membrane properties, surface functionality, and long blood circulation time which make them suitable for cancer therapy. These are bilayered vesicles capable of encapsulating both hydrophilic and hydrophobic drugs used to target glioma effectively. In this review, we have discussed on general preparation, characterization, and targeting aspects of surface modified polymersomes for effective delivery of therapeutic agents to glioma.

• Blood–brain barrier
• dual-targeting effect
• glioma
• polymersomes
• receptor-mediated endocytosis
• surface functionalization