Nanotechnology in the Context of Obesity

Obesity is a pandemic disease with immense magnitude and it is due to escalating death with co-morbidity in this century. Obesity is caused by combinatorial factors including genetic, metabolic, behavioral, environmental, cultural, and socioeconomic factors that contribute to a person’s body weight. This condition parse is alarmingly big magnitude problem and it is conformingly with the co-morbidities. An elevated body mass index (BMI) increases the prevalence, morbidity, and mortality of type 2 diabetes mellitus, hypertension, heart disease, stroke, osteoarthritis, respiratory tract disorders, gallstones, certain types of cancer, and psychological disorders. It is striking that only a few therapeutic agents are available to treat obesity including orlistat, sibutramine, lorcaserin, phentermine-topiramate available to treat obesity. These agents can reduce body weight by decreasing the consumption or absorption of food or by augmenting energy disbursement. In recent decades, the limelight of nanotechnology has opened numerous new vistas in medical sciences, especially in the area of drug delivery. The nanoparticulate drug delivery system can transport specific anti-obesity drugs to the white adipose tissue in the body, aiding to evade potential side effects that can occur if the drugs find their way to other parts of the body. In this chapter, we highlighted the various nano-drug delivery systems including polymeric nanoparticles, chitosan nanoparticles, Polyethylene glycol-based nanoparticles, gold nanoparticles, liposomes, transfersomes, and microparticles to enhance the therapeutic efficacy against obesity treatment.