title: Emerging Frontiers in Drug Delivery.
abstract: Medicine relies on the use of pharmacologically active agents (drugs) to manage and treat disease. However, drugs are not inherently effective; the benefit of a drug is directly related to the manner by which it is administered or delivered. Drug delivery can affect drug pharmacokinetics, absorption, distribution, metabolism, duration of therapeutic effect, excretion, and toxicity. As new therapeutics (e.g., biologics) are being developed, there is an accompanying need for improved chemistries and materials to deliver them to the target site in the body, at a therapeutic concentration, and for the required period of time. In this Perspective, we provide an historical overview of drug delivery and controlled release followed by highlights of four emerging areas in the field of drug delivery: systemic RNA delivery, drug delivery for localized therapy, oral drug delivery systems, and biologic drug delivery systems. In each case, we present the barriers to effective drug delivery as well as chemical and materials advances that are enabling the field to overcome these hurdles for clinical impact.
authors.affiliation: Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, United States.|Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, United States.
authors.forename: Mark W
authors.initials: MW
authors.lastname: Tibbitt
authors.affiliation: Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, United States.|Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology , Atlanta, Georgia 30332, United States.
authors.forename: James E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Dahlman
authors.affiliation: Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, United States.|Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, United States.|Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, United States.
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Langer
mesh_terms: D004337:Drug Carriers / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000737:chemistry; D016503:Drug Delivery Systems; D006801:Humans; D015394:Molecular Structure; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations / Q000008:administration & dosage* / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D004337:Drug Carriers; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations