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Review
. 2025;28(4):561-581.
doi: 10.2174/0113862073296206240416060154.

Targeted Drug Nanodelivery and Immunotherapy for Combating Tumor Resistance

Yun Liu  1 , Xinyu Sun  2 , Chen Wei  2 , Shoudong Guo  3 , Chunxiao Song  4 , Jiangyu Zhang  5 , Jingkun Bai  6
Affiliations
Review

Targeted Drug Nanodelivery and Immunotherapy for Combating Tumor Resistance

Yun Liu et al. Comb Chem High Throughput Screen. 2025.

Abstract

Chemotherapy resistance is a common cause of tumor treatment failure. Various molecular responses, such as increased expression of efflux transporter proteins, including Pglycoprotein (P-gp), changes in the tumor microenvironment (TME), the role of platelets, and the effects of cancer stem cells (CSCs), can lead to drug resistance. Through extensive research on the mechanisms of drug resistance, more effective anti-resistance drugs and therapeutic approaches are being developed. This review explores drug resistance mechanisms and summarizes relevant anti-resistance drugs. In addition, due to the therapeutic limitations of the aforementioned treatments, new advances in nanocarrier-based combination immunotherapy to address the challenge of drug resistance have been described. Nanocarriers combined with immunotherapy can not only target tumor sites for targeted drug release but also modulate the autoimmune system and enhance immune efficacy, thereby overcoming tumor drug resistance. This review suggests new strategies for overcoming tumor drug resistance and is expected to inform tumor treatment and prognosis.

Keywords: Multidrug resistance; anti-resistance drugs.; chemotherapy; immunotherapy; nanotherapy; targeted drug delivery.

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