Cancer Therapy with Nanotechnology-Based Platforms

Submit Manuscript | http://medcraveonline.com MOJ Proteomics Bioinform 2015, 2(4): 00056 Hydrogel-nanoparticles use hydrophobic polysaccharides to encapsulate and deliver proteins, peptides, and drugs. Hydrogels are highly absorbent, and could be natural or synthetic polymers possessing appreciable degree of flexibility, depending on their surface structure. The designation of hydrogels as “smart materials”, stem from the fact that the cross-linked polymers with hydrophillic groups can alter their structure in response to varying salt concentrations, pH and temperature. By virtue of their carboxylic acid groups on the polymers, the negatively charged polymer chains repel each other when the sodium ions are removed, allowing the chains to uncoil. In this state the hydrogel can absorb more than 500% its own weight of water. It is the ability to absorb this quantum of water that makes the hydrogel very useful in encapsulation. Hydrogel-nanoparticles are immuno-stimulatory and readily taken up by dendritic cells (DCs). DCs are considered key regulators of immunity based on their unequalled ability to take up, process, and present antigens compared with other antigen presenting cells (APCs). The use of hydrogels to encapsulate tumor antigens to be presented to antigen-presenting cells, including DCs, would therefore be an attractive strategy, owing to the urgent need for an efficient system for cancer vaccines and immunotherapy toward tumor antigens. Furthermore, this would be a promising strategy since the tumors themselves generally evade immune detection. Recognizing this, extensive efforts have also been made to significantly improve upon the short lives of DCs in order to achieve optimal protective immunity.