9 - Dual and multistimuli-responsive block copolymers for drug delivery applications

Abstract

Currently, the major challenge for the treatment of various diseases including cancer is to develop efficient and smart nanocarriers that can retain the encapsulated or conjugated drug during blood circulation and programed release of the drug into diseased cells under an exogenous (temperature, light, magnetic field, etc.) or endogenous (pH, bioreduction, enzyme, etc.) stimulation. Toward this goal, modern macromolecular synthesis tools such as living radical polymerizations and “click” chemistry strategies were simultaneously emerged for the synthesis of various exogenous and endogenous stimuli-responsive block copolymer-based nanovehicles as promising drug carriers for the delivery of wide range of therapeutic agents. Notably, in the recent years, much research effort has been directed for the development of dual or multistimuli-responsive polymeric nanocarriers to further improve the drug delivery efficiency and specificity, so that release of the drug could be readily controlled by simultaneously exerting appropriate exogenous or endogenous stimuli triggers. Thus, a dual or multistimuli-responsive polymeric nanocarrier has attracted great interest due to the precise release of drugs in the pathological environment. In this chapter, we comprehensively describe the significant progresses of dual and multistimuli-responsive nanocarriers that have been extensively investigated in drug delivery and theranostic agent within the recent years