Oral administration of protein nanoparticles: An emerging route to disease treatment

Abstract Over the last two decades, developments in nanomedicine have resulted in technical advances with application to clinical science. Both organic and inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) have shown tolerability, pharmacologic specificity and biodegradability. A subclass of NPs, protein NPs, have garnered recent attention due to the inherent biocompatibility of protein substrates. Protein NPs are currently being employed widely in pharmaceuticals development with applications in nasal, pulmonary, intravenous, ocular and oral delivery. Despite the distinct advantages of orally administered pharmaceuticals, the development of oral delivery systems has been comparatively limited. Therefore, this review attempts to discuss the most recent experimental and pre-clinical findings in the development of protein NPs for oral delivery, while envisioning upcoming challenges.