Arash Abdolmaleki
1,2 
, Asadollah Asadi
3* , Krishnamoorthy Gurushankar
4,5, Tahereh Karimi Shayan
3, Fatemeh Abedi Sarvestani
31 Department of Engineering Sciences, Faculty of Advanced Technologies, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Namin, Iran.
2 Bio Science and Biotechnology Research center (BBRC), Sabalan University of Advanced Technologies (SUAT), Namin, Iran.
3 Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Ardabil, Iran.
4 Laboratory of Computational Modeling of Drugs, Higher Medical and Biological School, South Ural State University, Chelyabinsk-454 080, Russia.
5 Department of Physics, Kalasalingam Academy of Research and Education, Krishnankoil- 626126, Tamil Nadu, India.
Abstract
Cancer is one of the deadly diseases leading to approximately 7.6 million deaths worldwide, with the mortality rate of 13%, and the number of deaths is expected to increase to 13.1 million within the next 10 years. In controlled drug delivery systems (DDS), the drug is transported to the desired location. Thus, the influence of drugs on vital tissues and undesirable side effects can be minimised. Additionally, DDS protects the drug from rapid degradation or clearance and enhances drug concentration in target tissues, and therefore, minimise the required dose of drug. This modern form of therapy is particularly important when there is a discrepancy between the dose and concentration of a drug. Cell-specific targeting can be achieved by attaching drugs to individually designed carriers. Recent developments in nanotechnology have shown that nanoparticles (particles with diameter < 100 nm in at least one dimension) have great potential as drug carriers. Because of their small size, these nanostructures exhibit unique physicochemical and biological properties that make them a favourable material for biomedical applications. Therefore, in this review, we aimed to describe the importance and types of nanomedicines and efficient ways in which new drug delivery systems for the treatment of cancer can be developed.