Smart Nanoparticles for Biomedicine

Nanotechnology has enabled an unprecedented control of the interactions between materials and biological entities, from the microscale down to the molecular level. Nanosurfaces and nanostructures have been used to mimic or interact with biological microenvironments, to support specific biological functions such as cell adhesion, mobility and differentiation, as well as tissue healing. Recently, a new paradigm has been proposed for nanomedicine to exploit the intrinsic properties of nanomaterials as active devices rather than as passive structural units or carriers for medications. Here, the nanomaterial itself is the active device that responds to external stimuli by modifying its intrinsic chemical and/or physical characteristics, so as to provide useful bio-stimulation and/or bio-signaling.

Smart Nanoparticles for Biomedicine explores this ‘active’ category, introducing smart nanoparticles that change their structural or functional properties in response to specific external stimuli (electric or magnetic fields, electromagnetic radiation, ultrasound, etc.). Particular attention is given to multifunctional nanostructured materials that are pharmacologically active and that can be actuated by virtue of their magnetic, dielectric, optically-active, redox-active, or piezoelectric properties.

This is an important reference resource, that will be of great value to readers in biomaterials and biomedical research who want to learn more about how smart nanoparticles can be used to create more effective treatment solutions.

Discusses the synthesis, the characterization and the applications of a new generation of smart nanoparticles, for nanomedicine applicationsExplores the problems related to the biocompatibility of a range of nanoparticles, outlining potential solutionsDescribes techniques for manipulating specific classes of nanoparticles for a variety of treatment types

1. Introduction: Smart materials in biomedicine 2. Smart polymeric nanoparticles 3. Smart liposomes for drug delivery 4. Pharmacologically-active plant-derived natural products 5. Nanostructured cyanoacrylates: biomedical applications 6. Applications of carbon nanotubes in the biomedical field 7. Carbon nanomaterials for nanomedicine 8. Silica nanoparticles applications in the biomedical field 9. Magnetic nanoparticles and their bio-applications 10. TiO2 nanotube arrays as smart platforms for biomedical applications 11. Antioxidant Inorganic nanoparticles and their potential applications in biomedicine 12. Zinc oxide nanostructures in biomedicine 13. Smart inorganic nanoparticles for wireless cell stimulation 14. Nano-sized optical thermometers 15. Advanced optical microscopy techniques for the investigation of cell-nanoparticle interactions