Development of Polymeric Drug Delivery System for Anti Cancer Agents

Controlled drug delivery regulates the release of drugs to a specific target site for an extended period of time with negligible side effect to the host cells. The application of controlled drug delivery in cancer treatment using both mono and combined drug therapy is overcoming the inconvenience of severe toxic effect produced as a result of conventional drug delivery system. Also combined medication in cancer treatment further reduces the risk of destroying the normal healthy cells and simultaneously producing a cytotoxic influence to the cancer cells. Therefore controlled drug delivery by adopting combined drug therapy is an emerging clinical challenge in cancer therapy. Excipients such as polymers, crosslinkers, surfactant etc., are considered to be suitable for controlled drug delivery applications because of their good biocompatibility, biodegradability, less toxicity with efficient drug loading efficiency. This thesis focuses on the fabrication of drug loaded/coloaded polymeric nanoparticles by adopting the controlled drug delivery approach. Natural polymers such as soyflour, xanthan gum, chitosan and its phosphorylated derivative were employed for the delivery of silibinin, (����)-α Lipoic acid, curcumin and quercetin, either alone or in combination. Reinforcing agent (ZnO nanoparticles), crosslinkers and surfactant were used and their effects were evaluated to attain better characteristics of the nanoparticles with regard to drug loading, particle size, drug release etc. The biocompatibility and cytotoxicity of all the prepared nanoparticles was assessed in vitro in both normal as well as cancer cell lines.