Cancer treatment with nano-diamonds

Front Biosci (Schol Ed). 2017 Jan 1;9(1):62-70. doi: 10.2741/s473.

Abstract

Diamond nano-particles find new and far-reaching applications in modern biomedical science and biotechnologies. Due to its excellent biocompatibility, nano-diamonds serve as versatile platforms that can be embedded within polymer-based microfilm devices. Nano-diamonds are complexed with a chemotherapeutic that enables sustained/slow release of the drug for a minimum of one month, with a significant amount of drug in reserve. This opens up the potential for highly localized drug release as a complementary and potent form of treatment with systemic injection towards the reduction of continuous dosing, and as such, attenuation of the often powerful side effects of chemotherapy. Nano-diamonds are quite economical, enabling the broad impact of these devices towards a spectrum of physiological disorders e.g. serving as a local chemotherapeutic patch, or as a pericardial device to suppress inflammation after open heart surgery. Nano-diamond patch could be used to treat a localized region where residual cancer cells might remain after a tumor is removed. Nano-diamonds can be used to explore a broad range of therapeutic classes, including additional small molecules, proteins, therapeutic antibodies, RNAi.

Publication types

  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Humans
  • Nanodiamonds / therapeutic use*
  • Neoplasms / drug therapy*

Substances

  • Nanodiamonds