Question: How can the nanoparticles deliver the cancer drug?

Philippa Bird answered on 27 Jun 2012:

Hi, thanks for your question.
You put the drug inside the nanoparticle, usually by soaking it in a solution of the drug and they enter (by diffusion).
Then you put the nanoparticles in the drug, and they travel through the blood until they reach the cancer cells. There are two ways it reaches the cancer cells, firstly there are more holes in the blood vessels around the cancer cells so they can get through easily (the tumour grows blood vessels with holes in to steal all the nutrients from the healthy cells). The other way is that you can put special groups on the surface of the nanoparticles which match exactly with “receptors” on the cancer cells, like the right key in a lock. So you can send the nanoparticle to the cancer cell instead of the healthy cell.
Once the nanoparticle is inside the cell, the drug can be released either by a change in pH inside the cell, or there are several ways of “capping” holes in the nanoparticles and then you can use some form of radiation to release the cap.