Specific delivery of therapeutic agents to solid tumors and their bioavailability at the target site are the most clinically important and challenging goals in cancer therapy. Liposomes are promising nanocarriers and have been well investigated for cancer therapy. In spite of preferred accumulation in tumors via the enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect, inefficient drug release at t...

Specific delivery of therapeutic agents to solid tumors and their bioavailability at the target site are the most clinically important and challenging goals in cancer therapy. Liposomes are promising nanocarriers and have been well investigated for cancer therapy. In spite of preferred accumulation in tumors via the enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect, inefficient drug release at t...

Pemetrexed (PMX) is a newly developed multi-targeted anti-folate with promising clinical activity in many solid tumors including malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM). However, PMX does not show sufficient anti-tumor activity in vivo when used alone either due to inefficient delivery of adequate concentrations to tumor tissue or dose-limiting side effects. In order to overcome these problems and...

Natural products using plants have received considerable attention because of their potential to treat various diseases. Arrabidaea chica (Humb. & Bonpl.) B. Verlot is a native tropical American vine with healing properties employed in folk medicine for wound healing, inflammation, and gastrointestinal colic. Applying nanotechnology to plant extracts has revealed an advantageous strategy for he...

Silymarin, a known extract, is used in the treatment of liver diseases with various origins, but its current administration form cannot target the liver because of its poor oral bioavailability. A new type of oral silymarin proliposome aimed at improving silymarin's poor bioavailability and hepatoprotective effects, is introduced in this work. Silymarin-loaded liquid proliposome were prepared u...

Shikonin (SHK) has been proven to have a good anti-tumor effect. However, poor water solubility and low bioavailability limit its wide application in clinical practice. In this study, to overcome these drawbacks, RGD-modified shikonin-loaded liposomes (RGD-SSLs-SHK) were successfully prepared. It exhibited excellent physicochemical characteristics including particle size, zeta potential, encaps...

Beta-carotene is the main dietary source of Vitamin A, an essential micronutrient required to maintain proper health. The in vivo bioavailability and absorption of beta-carotene, however, is limited due to the inhibition by the natural plant matrices in which it is found. This study focused on microencapsulation methods to improve release and bioavailability in vitro. Alginate and chitosan form...

Outer membrane of Gram-negative bacteria is a permeability barrier to many antibacterial agents, including the glycopeptide antibiotics such as vancomycin hydrochloride and as a result these antibiotics are ineffective against Gram negative bacteria. Different strategies have been described to overcome such limitation, including application of nanoparticles, as was shown in our previous studies...

Intranasal vaccination is particularly a striking route for mucosal immunization, due to the ease of administration and the induction of both mucosal and humoral immunity. However, soluble antigens (Ag) are not sufficiently taken up after the nasal administration and need to be co-administered with adjuvants, penetration enhancers or encapsulated in particles. So, in this study, tetanus toxoid ...

The current methods for treatment of cancers are inadequate and more specific methods such as gene therapy are in progress. Among different vehicles, cationic liposomes are frequently used for delivery of genetic material. This investigation aims to prepare and optimize DOTAP cationic liposomes containing an antisense oligonuclotide (AsODN) against protein kinase C alpha in non-small cells lung...