Nanogel-Incorporated Physical and Chemical Hybrid Gels for Highly Effective Chemo–Protein Combination Therapy

© 2015 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim 6744 wileyonlinelibrary.com of drug-delivery systems capable of protecting the active agents from proteolytic and chemical degradation and decreasing drug-related toxicity is of great importance. Although the development of monotherapies based on either small molecules or protein drugs using various delivery technologies is certainly a very active area of research for cancer treatment, combination therapy has shown an even larger potential as an alternative to monotherapy by targeting different apoptosis pathways simultaneously, leading to synergistic anticancer effects. [ 3,4 ] Typical combination therapies involve the co-delivery of two chemotherapeutic agents [ 5,6 ] or the combination of chemotherapy with another type of therapy, such as immunotherapy, [ 7,8 ] hormone therapy, [ 9 ] radiation therapy, [ 10 ] or gene therapy. [ 11 ] There has been great interest in using protein therapeutics, such as monoclonal antibodies, [ 12 ] cytokines, [ 13,14 ] and enzymes, [ 15 ]