Recent Advances in Renal Clearable Inorganic Nanoparticles for Cancer Diagnosis

The rapid growth of inorganic nanoparticles provides numerous opportunities for cancer diagnosis. Due to their adjustable and diverse characteristics that are strongly dependent on the size, morphology, charge, and the nature of surface coatings, they are widely used in the field of oncology. However, inorganic nanomaterials are usually difficult to degrade and excrete within a short time, resulting in long-term in vivo retention and potential toxicity, which significantly hinders their translation into clinical practice. Therefore, the development of renal clearable inorganic nanomaterials that can excrete out of body within desired timeframe is of great significance to promote their clinical bioapplications. Herein, the recent advances in renal clearable inorganic nanoparticles for tumor diagnosis are focused on, and the factors affecting the renal clearance efficiency, with a view to understand the underlying metabolism mechanism and the relevant bioapplications, are discussed.