title: Injected nanocrystals for targeted drug delivery.
abstract: Nanocrystals are pure drug crystals with sizes in the nanometer range. Due to the advantages of high drug loading, platform stability, and ease of scaling-up, nanocrystals have been widely used to deliver poorly water-soluble drugs. Nanocrystals in the blood stream can be recognized and sequestered as exogenous materials by mononuclear phagocytic system (MPS) cells, leading to passive accumulation in MPS-rich organs, such as liver, spleen and lung. Particle size, morphology and surface modification affect the biodistribution of nanocrystals. Ligand conjugation and stimuli-responsive polymers can also be used to target nanocrystals to specific pathogenic sites. In this review, the progress on injected nanocrystals for targeted drug delivery is discussed following a brief introduction to nanocrystal preparation methods, i.e., top-down and bottom-up technologies.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, School of Pharmacy, Fudan University, Shanghai 201203, China.
authors.forename: Yi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.affiliation: Shaanxi Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Xi׳an 710003, China.
authors.forename: Ye
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, School of Pharmacy, Fudan University, Shanghai 201203, China.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wu
keywords: Biodistribution; Encapsulation; Ligand; Nanocrystals; Stimuli response; Targeted drug delivery