Cyclodextrin-based nanoparticles for pharmaceutical applications: a review

The development of effective drug delivery systems is very challenging due to poor solubility, low membrane permeability, instability, and short biological half-life of active substances. Conventional drug delivery systems lack the features of extended drug release and targeted drug delivery. These issues can be solved by cyclodextrins and derivatives. Benefits include higher bioavailability, targeted drug delivery, non-toxicity, inclusion complex ability, and higher aqueous solubility. Cyclodextrin-conjugated nanoparticles combine the advantages of cyclodextrins and nanoparticles: enhanced water solubility and drug loading, targeted drug delivery with minimum toxicity to normal cells, greater surface area, improved drug loading and higher stability than other nanocarriers such as microparticles and liposomes. Here, I review cyclodextrin-containing nanoparticles and their applications in advanced drug delivery such as anticancer drugs, gene delivery, protein, and peptide drug delivery. Furthermore, this review also describes cyclodextrins applications using polymeric, gold, silver, magnetic, and lipid-based nanoparticles. Additionally, I present potential pharmaceutical applications of amphiphilic cyclodextrin-based nanoparticles in anticancer, antimicrobial, gene delivery, and miscellaneous administration routes of cyclodextrin-based nanoparticles such as nasal and transdermal.