Engineered Nanomaterials: The Challenges and Opportunities for Nanomedicines

Abstract

The emergence of nanotechnology as a key enabling technology over the past years has opened avenues for new and innovative applications in nanomedicine. From the business aspect, the nanomedicine market was estimated to worth USD 293.1 billion by 2022 with a perception of market growth to USD 350.8 billion in 2025. Despite these opportunities, the underlying challenges for the future of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) in nanomedicine research became a significant obstacle in bringing ENMs into clinical stages. These challenges include the capability to design bias-free methods in evaluating ENMs' toxicity due to the lack of suitable detection and inconsistent characterization techniques. Therefore, in this literature review, the state-of-the-art of engineered nanomaterials in nanomedicine, their toxicology issues, the working framework in developing a toxicology benchmark and technical characterization techniques in determining the toxicity of ENMs from the reported literature are explored.

Keywords: Taylor dispersion analysis; asymmetric flow field-flow fractionation; engineered nanomaterials; nanomedicine; nanotoxicology; particle tracking analysis.

Figure 1

Trends in the development of nanomedicines. (A) FDA-approved nanomedicines stratified by category; (B) FDA-approved nanomedicines stratified by category overall. Notes: Reprinted by permission from Springer Nature Customer Service Centre GmbH: Springer Nature; Nature Nanotechnology; Bobo D, Robinson KJ, Islam J, Thurecht KJ, Corrie SR. Nanoparticle-based medicines: a review of FDA-approved materials and clinical trials to date. Pharm Res. 2016;33:2373–2387; Copyright 2016.45

Figure 2

Four directions in utilizing ENMs in nanomedicine in refining their cancer-treating performance. Notes: Reprinted by permission from Springer Nature Customer Service Centre GmbH: Springer Nature; Nature Nanotechnology; van der Meel R, Sulheim E, Shi Y, et al. Smart cancer nanomedicine. Nat Nanotechnol. 2019;14:1007–1017; Copyright 2019.

Figure 3

Nanomaterials used as therapeutic agents in nanomedicines, particularly ocular. Notes: Mehra NK, Cai D, Kuo L, Hein T, Palakurthi S. Safety and toxicity of nanomaterials for ocular drug delivery applications. Nanotoxicology. 2016;10:836–860, reprinted by permission of the publisher (Taylor & Francis Ltd, http://www.tandfonline.com).

Figure 4

The fate of ENMs, their effects and cycle in human body.

Figure 5

Pyramid model on the determination of ENMs design, production and toxicity assessment. Notes: Adapted with permission from Mirshafiee V, Jiang W, Sun B, Wang X, Xia T. Facilitating translational nanomedicine via predictive safety assessment. Mol Ther. 2017;25:1522–1530. .

Figure 6

Knowledge-sharing platform in assessing the toxicity of ENMs in nanomedicine. Notes: Reprinted by permission from Springer Nature CustomerService Centre GmbH: Springer Nature; Nature Nanotechnology; Fadeel B, Farcal L, Hardy B, et al. Advanced tools for the safety assessment of nanomaterials. Nat Nanotechnol. 2018;13:537–543; Copyright 2018.

Figure 7

The extrinsic-intrinsic properties balance for the selection of ENM to be used in nanomedicine.

Figure 8

Illustration of the advantage of separation hyphenation with multi-detectors vs DLS technique.