How Nanotechnology Can Boost Drug Discovery
Nanotechnology in medicine, or more precisely nanomedicine, has become an exciting avenue for the pharmaceutical field.
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This area of research has gained momentum since it was introduced in 1959 by American physicist and Nobel laureate, Richard Feynman. It can almost be said that the versatility of this field is limitless, with continuous discoveries for innovative applications by researchers, which have also included drug discovery.
drug discovery
Drug discovery refers to the process of designing new drugs. This can be a relatively long process that can take around 12 years or more, from identifying a target, such as a receptor, gene or protein, to where the drug is approved and ready to go to market.
Although this field has made significant contributions to society in the field of medicine and human health, it also faces many obstacles.
Challenges
Drug development is considered a complex process, with the first steps consisting of finding active compounds, which must also have a therapeutic impact on the chosen target.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has reported five stages of the drug development process, including: (i) discovery and development, (ii) preclinical research, (iii) clinical research, (iv) review of drugs by the FDA and (v) Post-marketing safety monitoring of drugs by the FDA.
The discovery of new drugs depends on new knowledge or information about a disease process. These can include large amounts of testing of molecular compounds to find a beneficial effect on diseases, improvements on existing treatments that have adverse effects, as well as new technologies that can provide new and innovative methods to target specific areas of concern in the body.
What may start out as a large volume of early-stage drug candidates slowly narrows down to a small number of compounds that have real potential to gain FDA approval for the disease for which it is intended.
Another challenge in this field also relates to cost, with the development of a “new molecular entity”, such as a small compound, or a “new biological entity”, which refers to biological drugs, including antibodies or gene therapies, having high expenses. Developing these types of drugs is expected to cost around $2.6 billion.
As you might expect, this can be a significant hurdle for many pharma companies, and even more so for new pharma companies who may have underestimated the large volume of molecules (and associated price) needed to produce a new drug treatment at each stage of development.
Increasing drug formulation optimization with high loading capacity is also a challenge for researchers to ensure that a large volume of drug will be available and well delivered at each dosage; this is also related to the hurdle of optimizing the most appropriate drug delivery system for each formulation.
These challenges can be burdensome for researchers, but with the advancement of nanotechnology, a promising solution for the pharmaceutical industry could be developed.
Boosting drug discovery through nanotechnology
Nanotechnology, which uses 1 and 100 nm nanoscale particles and materials, can play an important role in pharmaceuticals because these particles are smaller than conventional drug molecules, allowing entry through biological barriers that would otherwise be an obstacle.
Such a size is important because the passage of biological barriers such as the blood-brain barrier, which prevents many drugs from entering the brain, may allow the treatment of a range of brain-related diseases and disorders. An example of this includes brain cancer, such as glioblastoma multiforme, a common brain tumor associated with a poor prognosis. This brain cancer can be described as incurable and has an average survival rate of 15 months, with only 5.5% surviving five years after being diagnosed.
Increasing the ability to target brain-related diseases such as glioblastoma through the inclusion of nanotechnology in drug formulation, or nanoformulation, may increase the number of drugs approved to treat incurable diseases.
Drug discovery through this innovative approach can be boosted as it can enable precise targeting of receptors, proteins and other biological molecules, thereby improving the efficiency of drug development and delivery. This may also be favored by nanoparticles having higher solubility and surface functionalization, allowing ligands to be placed on their surfaces to enable higher levels of targeting.
Future prospects
Since the 1970s, there have been approximately over 60 drug applications that have been approved involving nanomaterials, which have continued to gain momentum over the years.
Drug formulations based on nanomaterials may include different biological pathways than a conventional small molecule drug and subsequently this may influence the safety, quality and even efficacy of the drug. This challenge would require further investigation into the complexities of nanoformulations and how it may affect a patient. live.
These challenges led the Nanotechnology Risk Assessment Task Force to assess the potential effect of nanotechnology on drugs in 2014, with expertise from the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER).
Such a development has made it possible to develop drug standards, with the CDER having introduced in 2017 a guide for drugs and biological products including nanomaterials. Guidance for this innovative category may allow for the development of a greater volume of drugs for diseases and disorders that were previously difficult to treat, such as brain cancer.
Read on: Applications of bioactively charged nanotechnology for drug discovery.
References and further reading
Bayda, S., Adeel, M., Tuccinardi, T., Cordani, M. and Rizzolio, F., 2019. The history of nanoscience and nanotechnology: from chemical and physical applications to nanomedicine. Molecules, 25(1), p.112. Available at: 10.3390/molecules25010112
Kanderi T, Gupta V. Glioblastoma Multiforme. [Updated 2021 Nov 20]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2022 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK558954/
Kumar Dash, D., Kant Panik, R., Kumar Sahu, A. & Tripathi, V., 2020. Role of nanobiotechnology in drug discovery, development and molecular diagnostics. Applications of nanobiotechnology,. Available at: 10.5772/intechopen.92796
Mohs, R. and Greig, N., 2017. Drug Discovery and Development: The Role of Basic Biological Research. Alzheimer & Dementia: Translational Research & Clinical Interventions, 3(4), pp.651-657. Available at: 10.1016/j.trci.2017.10.005
Shi, J., Votruba, A., Farokhzad, O. and Langer, R., 2010. Nanotechnology in drug delivery and tissue engineering: from discovery to applications. Nano-letters, 10(9), pp.3223-3230. Available at: 10.1021/nl102184c
US Food and Drug Administration. 2022. Stage 1: Discovery and development. [online] Available at: https://www.fda.gov/patients/drug-development-process/step-1-discovery-and-development
US Food and Drug Administration. 2022. Advancing the Science of Nanotechnology in Drug Development. [online] Available at: https://www.fda.gov/drugs/news-events-human-drugs/advancing-science-nanotechnology-drug-development