ABSTRACT
Nanoparticles (NPs) have been widely applied for drug delivery. NPs circumvent many challenges of the traditional drug. They improve the drug biosafety, enhance the drug efficacy, provide a targeted delivery system for the investigated drugs, improve bioavailability, offer synergic effect using photothermal or photodynamic effect, and improve the stability of therapeutic agents against chemical and enzymatic degradation. However, they show disadvantages of intrinsic toxicities of the nanocarrier, pathogenic tendency of bio-vesicles, lack of understanding for the mechanistic pathways of the system, and accumulation in the body, tissue, or organs. Thus, 122the factors influencing the performance of the delivery system should be carefully investigated. This chapter is a valuable reference source for those scientists working in the field of pharmaceutical sciences, medicine, bionanotechnology, materials science, biomedical sciences, and related areas of life sciences. We have focused on the most relevant references and concisely summarized the findings with illustrated examples.
