Novel Treatment Approaches for Brain Tumour from a Blood–Brain Barrier Perspective

For a chemotherapeutic agent to be effective, it must conquer the presence of blood–brain barrier (BBB), which limits the penetration of drugs into the brain. Tumours in the brain compromise the integrity of BBB and result in a highly heterogeneous vasculature, known as blood–brain tumour barrier (BBTB). In this chapter, we firstly highlight the cellular and molecular characteristics of the BBB and BBTB as well as the challenges aroused by BBB/BBTB for drug delivery. Secondly, we discuss the current strategies overcoming the challenges in invasive and non-invasive manners. Finally, we highlight the emerging strategy using focused ultrasound (FUS) with systemic microbubbles to transiently and reversibly enhance the permeability of these barriers for drug delivery.