Nanocarrier centered therapeutic approaches: Recent developments with insight towards the future in the management of lung cancer

At present, drug delivery strategies for minimizing unwanted toxicity to healthy cells and improving the therapeutic efficacy have gained greater momentum, especially for lung cancer diagnosis and chemotherapy. Advances in material sciences have provided novel nanoscale active and passive targeting strategies that provide a new hope to lung cancer suffering patients. Various types of nanocarriers have already been approved for medical use, while many are under preclinical as well as clinical investigations. Nanocarrier based drug delivery is an emerging modality for the treatment of dreadful lung cancer as it offers enhanced bioavailability by improving the pharmacokinetics of a poorly water-soluble drug, in vivo stability, better solubility, greater safety as well as sustained and controlled targeted drug delivery. It bestows the targeting potential than conventional drug delivery on account of selective accumulation of innovative nanocarriers in the tumor site. To date, various types of nanocarriers have been investigated against lung cancer that comprises of liposomes, polymer-drug conjugates, polymersomes, nanoparticles, micelles, dendrimers, carbon nanotubes, and nanofibres. Thus, this review aims to provide an overview of several types of receptors overexpressed in lung cancer and focused therapeutic involvement of nanosized carriers as targeting/developing tools for the treatment of lung cancer. It also provides insights into the formulation challenges and physicochemical characteristics of nanocarriers affecting it's in vitro and in vivo performance. The nanocarrier based novel imaging platforms are also emphasized as a diagnostic means in the management of lung cancer.