Nanomedicine, as the new achievement in combination of nanotechnology and medical science, has the potential to accurately monitor tumor for early diagnosis and dramatically improve the targeted, long-lasting and combinational therapy. Compared with traditional chemotheraphy, nanomedicine would effectively improve the drug accumulation and controlled release in the tumor sites to improve the therapeutic effect. Recently, all kinds of nanomedicines are designed and synthesized for tumor diagnosis and treatment based on inorganic nanocarriers, such as quantum dots, gold nanoparticles, silicon nanoparticles and so on. They might be adjusted and promoted their properties by core-shell structure, surface modification and other strategies. In this review, the inorganic nanometre materials as nanodrug carriers applied in tumor diagnosis and treatment were summarized; nanodrug carriers design strategies and mechanisms of tumor diagnosis and treatment were introduced in detail, the future and several questions still need to resolve about inorganic nanodrugs in tumor diagnosis and treatment of clinical application was prospected.
Keywords: Nanoparticles; drug delivery; pharmaceuticals; photochemistry; self-assembly.