Albumin is derived from plasma and it is the most abundant protein in plasma, which is an ideal material for the preparation of nanoparticles because of its good biocompatibility, noncytotoxicity, nonimmunogenicity, biodegradability, and so on. Besides, albumin can enhance the targeting of drugs, reduce the toxicity of free drugs, and enhance the water solubility of hydrophobic drugs, etc. Drug delivery systems based on albumin nanoparticles are widely used in the medical field. At present, the main methods of preparing albumin nanoparticles are desolvation, self-assembly, thermal gelation, spray-drying, double emulsification, emulsification, Nab-technology, pH coacervation, and so on. Due to the differences of principle and preparation conditions, these methods show different advantages and disadvantages. This review systematically summarizes the latest research progress of albumin nanoparticles about its methods of preparation in past five years, and it also introduces the latest applications in cancer therapy, existing difficulties. Thus, this review can fill the two gaps that few articles focus comprehensively on the application of albumin nanoparticles in tumor therapy and no article clearly points out the difficulties faced in current research of albumin nanoparticles.
Albumin is derived from blood plasma and is the most abundant protein in blood plasma, which has good mechanical properties, biocompatibility and degradability, so albumin is an ideal biomaterial for biomedical applications, and drug-carriers based on albumin can better reduce the cytotoxicity of drug. Currently, there are numerous reviews summarizing the research progress on drug-loaded albumin molecules or nanoparticles. In comparison, the study of albumin-based hydrogels is a relatively small area of research, and few articles have systematically summarized the research progress of albumin-based hydrogels, especially for drug delivery and tissue engineering. Thus, this review summarizes the functional features and preparation methods of albumin-based hydrogels, different types of albumin-based hydrogels and their applications in antitumor drugs, tissue regeneration engineering, etc. Also, potential directions for future research on albumin-based hydrogels are discussed.
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