Nanoparticles as Drug Carriers: Current Issues with in Vitro Testing

Abstract

Incorporation of nanotechnology in the field of drug delivery has created exciting opportunities for the purposeful design of nanocarriers with potentials such as targeted delivery or controlled release of the incorporated cargo, improvement of bioavailability and reduction of therapeutic side-effects. Prior to in vivo administration, nanocarriers should undergo a set of in vitro evaluation procedures to ensure their stability, safety, conformity and ability to fulfill the desired mission. In this paper, current issues with in vitro evaluation techniques used for nanocarrier characterization (assessment of particle size, surface charge, drug release and toxicity) will be discussed. Furthermore, sufficiency of in vitro evaluation procedures for the prediction of in vivo scenarios and the necessary considerations to improve the correlation between the two settings will be debated.

Keywords::

• drug incorporation
• drug release
• in vitro assessment procedures
• nanocarriers
• particle size
• release kinetics
• surface charge
• toxicity

Financial & competing interests disclosure

MA Shetab Boushehri would like to acknowledge German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, DAAD) for financial support. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

MA Shetab Boushehri would like to acknowledge German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, DAAD) for financial support. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed. No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.