Carbon Nanomaterials for Breast Cancer Treatment

Abstract

Currently, breast cancer is considered as a health problem worldwide. Furthermore, current treatments neither are capable of stopping its propagation and/or recurrence nor are specific for cancer cells. Therefore, side effects on healthy tissues and cells are common. An increase in the efficiency of treatments, along with a reduction in their toxicity, is desirable to improve the life quality of patients affected by breast cancer. Nanotechnology offers new alternatives for the design and synthesis of nanomaterials that can be used in the identification, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer and has now become a very promising tool for its use against this disease. Among the wide variety of nanomaterials, the scientific community is particularly interested in carbon nanomaterials (fullerenes, nanotubes, and graphene) due to their physical properties, versatile chemical functionalization, and biocompatibility. Recent scientific evidence shows the potential uses of carbon nanomaterials as therapeutic agents, systems for selective and controlled drug release, and contrast agents for diagnosing and locating tumors. This generates new possibilities for the development of innovative systems to treat breast cancer and can be used to detect this disease at much earlier stages. Thus, applications of carbon nanomaterials in breast cancer treatment are discussed in this article.

Current Advances in Photoactive Agents for Cancer Imaging and Therapy

“…CBNs are typically biocompatible, allowing for immune evasion, prolonged blood circulation time, and increased tumor-targeting ability. The most common CBNs used for theranostic purposes, both as direct PSs and as carriers for loading PSs, are graphene, carbon nanotubes, and fullerenes (96). They offer several advantages, including high quantum yield, high stability, and good biocompatibility (97).…”

Application of Carbon Nanotubes in Breast Cancer Therapy

“…These structure can also be produced from graphite sheets where carbon atoms are located in the apexes of a hexagonal net. They are chemically stable, possess high thermal and electrical conductance, mechanical strength and surface area [23]. CNTs are completely insoluble in all solvents, which gives them toxicity and health-related concerns.…”

“…Large surface area and thermal and electrical stability of carbon nanotubes allow the attachment of various biological molecules to its surface, making them suitable candidate to form drug delivery system. For example, Cationic fullerenes have tendency to bind to anionic tumor cells hence providing affinity for targeted delivery of the drugs [23] The conjugation scheme of antibodies (Ab) is shown in ▶ Fig. 2.…”

A porous reduced graphene oxide/chitosan-based nanocarrier as a delivery system of doxorubicin

“…Nowadays, the targeting and drug controllable properties are the main concerns in cancer treatment; 1,2 although they are highly efficient, anti-cancer drugs are not specic to cancer cells, and therefore, diverse side effects, including hair loss, nausea, vomiting, fatigue and risk of developing infections, may emerge during treatment. 3 Drug-delivery systems (DDS) have been created for improving the therapeutic properties of drugs and are oen in the form of a drug-containing capsule. These systems release drugs in specic amounts at a specic site; therefore, they affect the pharmacokinetics and distribution of drugs.…”

“…14,15 Recent scientic evidence shows the potential uses of carbon nanomaterials as therapeutic agents, systems for selective and controlled drug release, and contrast agents for diagnosing and locating tumors. 3 In recent years, signicant efforts have been directed towards the use of porous structures as drug loading matrices due to their high surface area, tunable pore size and well-dened surface architectures. 16,17 Graphene oxide (GO) is a two-dimensional layered nanomaterial with high surface area to volume ratio.…”