Nanocarrier-mediated brain delivery of bioactives for treatment/prevention of neurodegenerative diseases

Abstract

The treatment for brain disorders specifically neurodegenerative diseases (NDDs) has been a main challenge in the medical field. NDDs are progressive, disabling, and non-curable disorders that exhibit not only critical health issues on human sufferings but also the economic burden on the medicare systems. Due to the lack of efficient therapies to fight NDDs, it remains a challenging problem for physicians to find out new therapeutics to enhance the life quality of patients suffering from NDDs. In addition to genetics and environmental risk factors, high cell level oxidative stress has been stated as one of the most known etiologies in NDDs. Given the high anti-inflammatory and antioxidant potentials of naturally occurring bioactive compounds, they have been becoming interested therapeutics for brain disorders, which could provide ameliorating effects on different brain disorders. These substances can be involved in various neurodegeneration pathways to exhibit their health-promoting effects. Despite their health-promoting effects, they have a low bioavailability and poorly delivered into central nervous systems due to blood-central nervous system (CNS) barriers, which causes inefficient delivery of bioactives. A potential solution for tackling these obstacles lies in revolutionary nanoengineered platforms. Therefore, this review will focus on bioactive-loaded nanocarriers that can improve the efficiency of bioactive compounds including their blood circulation time, bioavailability, evade immune system, and transporting them to CNS to release their potential effects on treating and/or preventing neurodegeneration progress in NDDs.

Keywords: Bioactive; Blood-CNS barrier; Nanocarrier; Nanomedicine; Neurodegeneration.