Search

Lung cancer is a leading cause of cancer related deaths worldwide and so current research is focused on trying to improve treatment modalities, such as photodynamic therapy (PDT). PDT has 3 fundamental factors, namely a photosensitizer (PS) drug, light and oxygen. When a PS drug is administered to a patient, it can either passively or actively accumulate within a tumour site and once exposed to a specific wavelength of light, it is stimulated to produce reactive oxygen species (ROS), resulting in tumour destruction. However, the efficacy of ROS generation for tumour destruction is highly dependent on the accumulation of the PS in tumour cells. Thus PS selective/targeted uptake and delivery in tumour cells is a crucial factor in PDT cancer drug absorption studies. Generally, within non-targeted drug delivery mechanisms, only small amounts of PS is able to passively accumulates in tumour sites due to the enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect and the remainder distributes into healthy tissues, causing side effects. Thus to improve the efficacy of PDT, research is currently focused on the development of specific receptor based photosynthetic nanocarrier drugs, which promotes the active uptake and absorption of PS drugs in tumour sites only, avoiding unwanted side effects. The aim of this review is to focus on current non-targeted passive versus specifically active targeted PS nanoparticle drug delivery systems, that have been investigated for the PDT treatment of lung cancer and so to deduce its efficacy and recent advancements.

The deregulation of cell growth in milk-producing glands, milk-carrying tubes, or connective tissues is known as breast cancer. It originates from genetic mutations and has the ability to metastasize. Primary tumor cells repetitively divide and lead to inappropriate mechanisms, tumorigenesis, and carcinogenesis, characterized by improper cell type, function, lifetime, and self-destruction. The tumor-specific activation is considered to be an effective strategy for selective cancer destruction, which remains an issue with conventional therapeutic approaches. The tumor microenvironment can be regulated and adapted through an interaction between pH, proteins, and other factors. Principally, human breast cancer genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2, produce tumor suppressors that prevent changes in genetic materials, as well as ensure their stability. Photodynamic therapy is a targeted cancer modality that depends on the photochemotherapeutic agent and light characteristics used to activate the compound. The possibility of eradicating breast cancer depends on continuous development of therapeutic approaches using third-generation photochemotherapeutic compounds to improve targeting this cancer and its stem cells.