Novel photovoltaic device for targeted drug delivery
Abstract
Despite decades of research, progress in targeted drug delivery is relatively slow, hampered, in part, by the lack of appropriate mechanisms to deliver anticancer drugs selectively to tumor tissues. Systemic or oral administration can cause severe toxicity, which limits the therapeutic potential of anticancer drugs*. Therefore, the most important goal of drug delivery is to minimize the exposure of normal tissues to these drugs while maintaining their therapeutic concentration in tumors. A photovoltaic cell (PV) is a system that converts lights into electricity as well as induces charge transfer by photovoltaic effect. Motivated by such unique property, we have hypothesized that a PV, which holds opposite charges on its surfaces, can serve as a new drug delivery system to carry cancer chemotherapeutic drugs or substances and release them when the charge intensity or polarity changes upon external photo stimulation, such as near Near-Infrared (NIR) light or Laser source. In this new strategy, taking advantage of the attraction and repulsion between a photovoltaic device and a substance is proposed to serve as a new drug delivery method. *Please refer to dissertation for reference.
Subject Area
Biomedical engineering|Pharmacy sciences
Recommended Citation
Ambure, Sunny Sharad, "Novel photovoltaic device for targeted drug delivery" (2011). ETD Collection for University of Texas, El Paso. AAI1494328.
https://scholarworks.utep.edu/dissertations/AAI1494328