Recent developments in nanomedicine for melanoma treatment

Abstract

Melanoma is a most aggressive skin cancer with limited therapeutic options and its incidence is increasing rapidly in recent years. The discovery and application of new targeted therapy agents have shown significant benefits. However, adverse side-effects and resistance to chemotherapy remain formidable challenges in the clinical treatment of malignant melanoma. Nanotherapeutics offers an important prospect of overcoming these drawbacks. The anti-tumoral applications of nanomedicine are varied, including those in chemotherapy, RNA interference, photothermal therapy, and photodynamic therapy. Furthermore, nanomedicine allows delivery of the effector structures into the tumor site via passive or active targeting, thereby allowing increased therapeutic specificity and reduced side effects. In this review, we summarize the latest developments in the application of nanocarrier-mediated targeted drug delivery to melanoma and nanomedicine-related clinical trials in melanoma treatment. We also discuss existing problems and opportunities for future developments, providing direction and new thoughts for further studies.

Copper Complex Nanoformulations Featuring Highly Promising Therapeutic Potential in Murine Melanoma Models

“…Furthermore, several liposomal nanoformulations for the treatment of human diseases are currently in clinical use, and many more in clinical trials [20]. In the case of melanoma, the application of putative nanotechnological therapeutic approaches has been providing encouraging results (reviewed in: [21,22]).…”

“…It is well-known that nanoliposomes are able to accumulate in regions of enhanced vascular permeability, as those found in inflammatory [23] and tumour pathologies [17,18,22,24]. This effect has been described as the enhanced permeation and retention (EPR) effect [25,26].…”

Photodynamic Therapy for Metastatic Melanoma Treatment: A Review

“… 21 Metastatic melanoma chemotherapeutic drugs include dacarbazine (DTIC), paclitaxel, platinum compounds, and temozolomide. 22 According to Tang et al , 23 malignant melanomas show <20% response rate to these types of drugs due to various resistance mechanisms. Chemotherapeutic drugs may be administered orally, via injection, intraperitoneal, intra-arterial, topically, or intravenously.…”

“…Chemotherapeutic drugs may be administered orally, via injection, intraperitoneal, intra-arterial, topically, or intravenously. 23 The drawback to chemotherapy is that it also causes damage to healthy cells as well as severe side effects in patients such as fatigue, secondary infections, anemia, nausea, vomiting, and constipation. 24 Thus, chemotherapy sessions are generally spread out during a period of time to allow patients’ bodies to recover between treatments.…”

“…Studies performed have noted that metastatic melanoma cells tend to overexpress integrin ανß3, extracellular matrix 1, a combination of Drosophilia protein and Caenorhabditis elegans protein, B-cell lymphoma 2, mitochondrial p32 protein, integrin alpha 4 beta 1 protein, ephrin type-A receptor 2, and TRAIL-receptor 2 on their cell surface receptors. 23 The protein melanoma inhibitory activity was identified as a key component that was involved in the progression and metastasis of malignant melanoma. 143 Thus, active NP–PS smart drugs can possibly be synthesized with mAbs, which bind using a lock-and-key mechanism to these specifically overexpressed cell surface antigen receptors, ensuring PS drugs are delivered to tumor target sites only and not healthy surrounding tissues.…”