Latest ArticlesMetabolomics technology played an important role in the field of biomedical research, such as disease diagnosis, pathogenesis analysis, drug target exploration, formulation of treatment guidelines, etc. Due to the systematic and holistic characteristics of metabolomics research, it has shown certain advantages in the analysis of the basis of pharmacodynamic substances of traditional Chinese medicines and the development of new medicines from traditional Chinese medicines. With the continuous innovation of metabolomics research, many advanced technologies have been developed, which make up for the shortcomings of conventional metabolomics studies in searching for disease targets, identifying functional compounds and interpreting biological significance. Furthermore, the rapid development of metabolomics technology has created new opportunities for the diagnosis of diseases and the development of new drugs in traditional Chinese medicine. Herein, different from conventional metabolomics techniques and methods, nine new metabolomics technologies with wide application prospects in the past 10 years were reviewed from the perspective of new tools, new ideas and new samples, with a view to providing new insights on relevant metabolomics research in the biomedical field and providing new motivation for innovation and development of metabolomics technologies.
Lipid-based nanocarrier is a classic drug delivery system with great biocompatibility and biodegradability. It can effectively reduce the toxicity of anti-tumor and anti-infective drugs in clinical practice. However, it has not yet met the clinical demand for enhanced therapeutic efficacy, and the clinical application is still very limited. The complex in vivo delivery process of lipid-based nanomedicine and the reciprocal interactions with body lead to unexpected changes in in vivo performance of nanomedicine and seriously hinder clinical translation. Therefore, the in-depth study of the relationships among intrinsic properties of lipid-based nanomedicine, the in vivo delivery process, and the regulatory mechanisms will not only provide guidance for the rational design of nanocarriers, but also promote the clinical translation and precision medicine of new lipid-based nanomedicine. In this review, we summarize the in vivo delivery process, regulating factors and intervention strategies for the in vivo delivery of lipid-based nanomedicine.
Small interfering RNA (siRNA) is the initiator of RNA interference and inhibits gene expression by targeted degradation of specific messenger RNA. siRNA-mediated gene regulation has high efficiency and specificity and exhibits great significance in the treatment of diseases. However, the naked or unmodified siRNA has poor stability, easy to degrade by nuclease, short half-life, and low intracellular delivery. As an emerging non-viral nucleic acid delivery system, ionizable lipid nanoparticles play an important role in improving the druggability of siRNA. At present, one siRNA drug based on ionizable lipid nanoparticles has been approved for the treatment of rare disease. This review introduces the research progress in ionizable lipid nanoparticles for siRNA delivery, focusing on the effect of each component of lipid nanoparticles on the efficiency of siRNA-mediated gene silencing, which provides new references for the studies on ionizable lipid nanocarriers for siRNA delivery.
Brain delivery of drugs remains challenging due to the presence of the blood-brain barrier (BBB). With advances in nanotechnology and biotechnology, new possibilities for brain-targeted drug delivery have emerged. Biomimetic nano drug delivery systems with high brain-targeting and BBB-penetrating capabilities, along with good biocompatibility and safety, can enable 'invisible' drug delivery. In this review, five different types of biomimetic strategies are presented and their research progress in central nervous system disorders is reviewed. Finally, the challenges and future prospects for biomimetic nano drug delivery systems in intracerebral drug delivery are summarized.
Immunotherapy has become another effective tumor treatment after surgical resection, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and targeted therapy. However, due to the low immunogenicity of tumor cells and immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment, antigen-presenting cells inefficiently process and present tumor antigens, thus leading to insufficient activation of cytotoxic T lymphocytes and tumor infiltration, which significantly affects the effectiveness of tumor immunotherapy. In recent years, it has been demonstrated that multiple metal ions exhibit distinguished modulatory effects in activating innate immune stimulation and conquering acquired immune tolerance. Based on this, scientists have designed a series of nano-adjuvant delivery systems with metal ions or metal nanoparticles to enhance the targeted accumulation of metal ions in tumor tissues or lymphoid organs for efficiently inducing immunogenic cell death or directly activating antigen-presenting cells to initiate anti-tumor specific immune response. This review briefly outlines the role of various metal ions in anti-tumor immunomodulation, summarizes the research progress in using metal nanoadjuvant delivery systems to achieve efficient anti-tumor immunotherapy, and provides foresight on the main challenges and potential directions in this field.
Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a new modality for cancer therapy, which has been used in the clinical treatment for various tumors, such as skin cancer, bladder cancer and prostate cancer. Most photosensitizers have the disadvantages of hydrophobic, low bioavailability and the limited tumor targeting ability. The nanoscale delivery systems can improve the solubility of photosensitizers and enhance their accumulation at the tumor sites. The multifunctional nano-delivery systems are prepared in combination with other anti-tumor drugs to enhance the anti-tumor effect. In addition to addressing the issues of poor solubility and the insufficient tumor targeting ability, the nanoscale delivery systems need to improve the pharmacokinetic properties of photosensitizers, facilitating their rapid accumulation at the tumor sites and quick elimination in vivo, and reducing the skin phototoxicity. This review summarizes the recent clinical application of PDT of cancer, the development of photosensitizers, the delivery systems for photosensitizers and the combinatorial application with other therapeutic methods. The goal is to present an understanding of knowledge on the design of new types of photosensitizers and its clinical application in PDT of cancer.
Intracerebral delivery of drugs for the treatment of central nervous system disorders is usually limited by the blood-brain barrier (BBB). Transdermal drug delivery systems (TDDS) have the advantage of improving patient compliance and avoiding first-pass effects compared to intravenous, oral and intranasal drug delivery, and are an emerging non-invasive drug delivery route that facilitates long-term drug delivery to patients. The discovery of direct subcutaneous targeting of lymphatic pathways to brain tissue has made TDDS a new brain-targeted drug delivery strategy. At the same time, the development of nano-delivery technology has further facilitated the application of TDDS for targeted drug delivery to the brain. This review summarizes the mechanism of transdermal drug delivery into the brain and the application of TDDS in the treatment of brain diseases, providing new ideas and methods for the treatment of central nervous system diseases.
Cancer is still one of the major diseases threatening human life and health. At present, how to achieve precise diagnosis and treatment of tumors is the biggest challenge in cancer treatment. Prodrugs use the tumor specificity of targeting molecules to deliver anticancer drugs to tumor sites, which can effectively improve drug bioavailability, therapeutic efficacy and safety, and are currently a hot spot in the research and development of anticancer drugs. The targeting molecules of prodrugs mainly include nucleic acid aptamers, polymers, antibodies, polypeptides, etc. Among them, polypeptides have the advantages of good biocompatibility, controllable degradation performance, high in vivo responsiveness, and simple and easy preparation methods, and are widely used. It is used to construct peptide-drug conjugates (PDC) prodrugs to achieve targeted therapy of tumors. In recent years, with the development of phage peptide library technology and peptide standard solid-phase synthesis technology, more and more targeted peptides have been discovered and effectively synthesized and modified, providing strong support for the development of PDC. This review briefly introduces the types and functions of functional peptides and linkers in PDC, and discusses the application of PDC in chemotherapy, immunotherapy and photodynamic therapy in tumor targeted diagnosis and treatment, and finally summarizes the difficulties faced by PDC drug development.
The successful development and application of mRNA COVID-19 vaccine fully illustrated the great potential and application prospect of mRNA technology in the field of biomedicine. Currently, many companies worldwide are developing drugs and vaccines based on mRNA technology for the prevention and treatment of various diseases. It can be foreseen that with the continuous launch of mRNA drugs, commercial GMP production capacity matching them is also urgent. The optimization of production processes, intelligent manufacturing and other risk control strategies, as well as the control of industrialization costs, will help improve the core competitiveness of mRNA innovative drug development. In view of this, this article will provide an overview of the global production process of mRNA drugs and the progress of related GMP production dynamics, sort out the key chain points of the mRNA industry chain, explore the construction of the mRNA pharmaceutical enterprise value chain and the formation of core competitiveness, and provide reference and reference for the research and development of innovative mRNA drugs and high-quality development in China.
The main sources of natural drugs include various biological species such as plants, animals, and microorganisms. The accurate identification of these species is the bedrock of natural drug development. We propose a novel method of species identification in this paper: analysis of whole-genome (AGE), a molecular diagnostic method used to identify species by finding species-specific sequences from the whole genome and precisely recognizing the specific target sequences. We elaborate that the principle for species identification based on AGE is that the genome sequences of diverse species must differ and divide the implementation strategy of the method into two levels of research and application. Based on our analysis of its characteristics, the method would have the potential advantages of reliable principle, high specificity, and wide applicability. Moreover, three crucial concerns related to building method systems including genome acquisition, bioinformatics analysis, and database construction, are further discussed. In summary, we offer theoretical underpinnings and methodological guidance for the development of bioinformatics software and commercial kits, indicating AGE has great application potential in objects, subjects, and industries.
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