Current applications and future prospects of nanomaterials in tumor therapy

Abstract

Tumors are one of the most serious human diseases and cause numerous global deaths per year. In spite of many strategies applied in tumor therapy, such as radiation therapy, chemotherapy, surgery, and a combination of these treatments, tumors are still the foremost killer worldwide among human diseases, due to their specific limitations, such as multidrug resistance and side effects. Therefore, it is urgent and necessary to develop new strategies for tumor therapy. Recently, the fast development of nanoscience has paved the way for designing new strategies to treat tumors. Nanomaterials have shown great potential in tumor therapy, due to their unique properties, including passive targeting, hyperthermia effects, and tumor-specific inhibition. This review summarizes the recent progress using the innate antitumor properties of metallic and nonmetallic nanomaterials to treat tumors, and related challenges and prospects are discussed.

Keywords: nanomaterials; nanoparticles; nanotechnology; tumor.

Figure 1

Metallic and nonmetallic nanomaterials that act as active medicine or drug additive in tumor therapy through their innate antitumor properties. Abbreviations: NMs, nanomaterials; NPs, nanoparticles.

Figure 2

Transmission electron microscope images of (A) iron oxide nanoparticles; (B) gold nanoparticles; (C) gold nanocages; (D) cerium oxide nanoparticles. Notes: Figure A adapted with permission from Bronstein LM, Huang XL, Retrum J, et al. Influence of iron oleate complex structure on iron oxide nanoparticle formation. Chem Mater. 2007;19(15):3624–3632. Copyright © 2007, American Chemical Society. Figure B adapted with permission from Schulz-Dobrick M, Sarathy KV, Jansen M. Surfactant-free synthesis and functionalization of gold nanoparticles. J Am Chem Soc. 2005;127(37):12816–12817. Copyright © 2007, American Chemical Society. Figure C adapted with permission from Chen JY, Wang DL, Xi JF, et al. Immuno gold nanocages with tailored optical properties for targeted photothermal destruction of cancer cells. Nano Lett. 2007;7(5):1318–1322. Copyright © 2007, American Chemical Society. The method reported in Lee et al was used when creating the nanoparticles shown in Figure D.

Figure 3

Structures of nonmetallic nanomaterials for tumor therapy. Notes: (A) C₆₀; (B) carbon nanotubes; (C) graphene; (D) chitosan-structure units β-(1,4)-2-amino-d-glucose and β-(1,4)-2-acetamido-d-glucose.