Abstract
Inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) exhibit relevant physical properties for application in biomedicine and specifically for both the diagnosis and therapy (i.e. theranostic) of severe pathologies, such as cancer. The inorganic NP core is often not stable in aqueous suspension and can induce cytotoxic effects. For this reason, over the years, several coating strategies were suggested to improve the NP stability in aqueous solutions as well as the NP biocompatibility. Among the various components which can be used for NP coatings, lipids, and in particular phospholipids emerged as versatile molecular building blocks for the production of NP coatings suitable for biomedical application. The recent synthetic efforts in NP lipid coatings allows today to introduce on the NP surface a large variety of lipid molecules eventually in mixture with amphiphilic or hydrophobic drugs or active molecules for cell targeting. In this review, the most relevant examples of NP lipid-coatings are presented and grouped in two main categories: supported lipid bilayers (SLB) and hybrid lipid bilayers (HLB). The discussed scientific cases take into account the most commonly used inorganic NP for biomedical applications in cancer therapy and diagnosis.
Highlights
Nanomaterials of all sort of shapes and compositions have been designed in the last decades for biomedical applications and in particular in both the diagnosis and the therapy of cancer (Mahmoudi et al, 2011; Liang et al, 2014; Giner-Casares et al, 2016)
Lipid molecules can be introduced on the NP surface according to two different arrangements: supported lipid bilayers (SLB) and hybrid lipid bilayer (HLB)
The inner layer of the hybrid lipid bilayers (HLB), might still contain lipid molecules, i.e. fatty acids, its molecular composition is different from the outer leaflet, which can be composed by other lipid molecules
Summary
Nanomaterials of all sort of shapes and compositions have been designed in the last decades for biomedical applications and in particular in both the diagnosis and the therapy of cancer (Mahmoudi et al, 2011; Liang et al, 2014; Giner-Casares et al, 2016). Cell membranes are mainly composed by phospholipids and act as a barrier to protect the cell components from the surrounding environment (Simons, 2016) In analogy with their biological functions, lipids resulted to be good candidates for different biomedical applications where they provide a biocompatible protective barrier on the nanomaterial surface (Bothun, 2008; Weingart et al, 2013). Their application is strongly limited by the high cytotoxicity which is often associated to them (Soenen et al, 2015) In this context, lipids and in particular phospholipids emerged as relevant candidates to produce nano-biointerfaces by coating the inorganic NP surface. The principal aspects of such interactions between lipid-coated NPs and biological interfaces will be discussed as a relevant aspect for a safe and effective application of biomedical nanomaterials
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