Nanoparticle Technology for Drug Delivery Across the Blood-Brain Barrier
Abstract
Nanoparticles (NP) are solid colloidal particles ranging in size from 1 to 1000 nm that are utilized as drug delivery agents. The use of NPs to deliver drugs to the brain across the blood-brain barrier (BBB) may provide a significant advantage to current strategies. The primary advantage of NP carrier technology is that NPs mask the blood-brain barrier limiting characteristics of the therapeutic drug molecule. Furthermore, this system may slow drug release in the brain, decreasing peripheral toxicity. This review evaluates previous strategies of brain drug delivery, discusses NP transport across the BBB, and describes primary methods of NP preparation and characterization. Further, influencing manufacturing factors (type of polymers and surfactants, NP size, and the drug molecule) are detailed in relation to movement of the drug delivery agent across the BBB. Currently, reports evaluating NPs for brain delivery have studied anesthetic and chemotherapeutic agents. These studies are reviewed for efficacy and mechanisms of transport. Physiological factors such as phagocytic activity of the reticuloendothelial system and protein opsonization may limit the amount of brain delivered drug and methods to avoid these issues are also discussed. NP technology appears to have significant promise in delivering therapeutic molecules across the BBB.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Colloidal carriers such as nanoparticles, polymers, liposomes, and micelles have become perhaps the most versatile approach for delivering compounds and macromolecules into inaccessible regions behind tissue barriers, particularly the brain.
“Colloidal carriers such as nanoparticles, polymers, liposomes, and micelles have become perhaps the most versatile approach for delivering compounds and macromolecules into inaccessible regions behind tissue barriers, particularly the brain (372, 519).”
From Blood-Brain Barrier: From Physiology to Disease and Back (2019) · cites this paper as [372]
Cites
Nanoparticulate systems for brain delivery of drugs.
Kreuter, J. (2001) · Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews · doi:10.1016/s0169-409x(00)00122-8 · Cited by 1,107 · see citing works
Olivier, J.-C., Fenart, L., Chauvet, R., Pariat, C., Cecchelli, R., & Couet, W. (1999) · Pharmaceutical Research · doi:10.1023/a:1018947208597 · Cited by 213 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Cancer nanotechnology: opportunities and challenges
Ferrari, M. (2005) · Nature Reviews Cancer · doi:10.1038/nrc1566 · Cited by 4,558 · see citing works
Blood-Brain Barrier: From Physiology to Disease and Back
Sweeney, M. D., Zhao, Z., Montagne, A., Nelson, A. R., & Zlokovic, B. V. (2019) · Physiological Reviews · doi:10.1152/physrev.00050.2017 · Cited by 2,294 · see citing works
Saraiva, C., Praça, C., Ferreira, R., Santos, T., Ferreira, L., & Bernardino, L. (2016) · Journal of Controlled Release · doi:10.1016/j.jconrel.2016.05.044 · Cited by 1,609 · see citing works
Agrawal, M., Saraf, S., Saraf, S., Antimisiaris, S. G., Chougule, M. B., Shoyele, S. A., & Alexander, A. (2018) · Journal of Controlled Release · doi:10.1016/j.jconrel.2018.05.011 · Cited by 630 · see citing works
Retinoids in the treatment of skin aging: an overview of clinical efficacy and safety
Mukherjee, S., Date, A., Patravale, V., Korting, H. C., Roeder, A., & Weindl, G. (2006) · Clinical Interventions in Aging · doi:10.2147/ciia.2006.1.4.327 · Cited by 580 · see citing works
Nanomaterials for Neural Interfaces
Kotov, N. A., Winter, J. O., Clements, I. P., Jan, E., Timko, B. P., Campidelli, S., Pathak, S., Mazzatenta, A., Lieber, C. M., Prato, M., et al. (2009) · Advanced Materials · doi:10.1002/adma.200801984 · Cited by 504 · see citing works
Recent progress in biomedical applications of pluronic (PF127): Pharmaceutical perspectives
Akash, M. S. H., & Rehman, K. (2015) · Journal of Controlled Release · doi:10.1016/j.jconrel.2015.04.032 · Cited by 394 · see citing works
The blood-brain barrier: structure, function and therapeutic approaches to cross it.
Tajes, M., Ramos-Fernández, E., Weng-Jiang, X., Bosch-Morató, M., Guivernau, B., Eraso-Pichot, A., Salvador, B., Fernàndez-Busquets, X., Roquer, J., & Muñoz, F. J. (2014) · Molecular Membrane Biology · doi:10.3109/09687688.2014.937468 · Cited by 380 · see citing works
Brain targeting of nerve growth factor using poly(butyl cyanoacrylate) nanoparticles
Kurakhmaeva, K. B., Djindjikhashvili, I. A., Petrov, V. E., Balabanyan, V. U., Voronina, T. A., Trofimov, S. S., Kreuter, J., Gelperina, S., Begley, D., & Alyautdin, R. N. (2009) · Journal of Drug Targeting · doi:10.1080/10611860903112842 · Cited by 221 · see citing works
CNS Drug Delivery Systems: Novel Approaches
Pathan, S., Iqbal, Z., Zaidi, S., Talegaonkar, S., Vohra, D., Jain, G., Azeem, A., Jain, N., Lalani, J., Khar, R., et al. (2009) · Recent Patents on Drug Delivery & Formulation · doi:10.2174/187221109787158355 · Cited by 193 · see citing works
Targeting receptor-ligand chemistry for drug delivery across blood-brain barrier in brain diseases
Anthony, D. P., Hegde, M., Shetty, S. S., Rafic, T., Mutalik, S., & Rao, B. S. S. (2021) · Life Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.lfs.2021.119326 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
Kumar, S., Yadav, A., Verma, R. K., Kumar, A., Gupta, P. K., & Shukla, R. (2025) · Molecular Pharmaceutics · doi:10.1021/acs.molpharmaceut.5c00386 · Cited by 14 · see citing works
- Authors
- Lockman, P. R., Mumper, R. J., Khan, M. A., & Allen, D. D.
- Affiliations
- Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (US)
- University of Kentucky (US)
- Venue
- Drug Development and Industrial Pharmacy
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2002-01
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 1-13
- ISSN
- 0363-9045 (ISSN-L)
- 1520-5762
- OpenAlex
- W2082640094
- Cited by
- 592
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 18 · 2024: 23 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 28 · 2021: 30 · 2020: 36 · 2019: 26 · 2018: 42 · 2017: 30 · 2016: 19 · 2015: 37 · 2014: 29 · 2013: 31 · 2012: 36
- FWCI
- 8.78
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Drug Development and Industrial Pharmacy (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Biomaterials › Nanoparticle-Based Drug Delivery
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Neurology › Barrier Structure and Function Studies
- Life Sciences › Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics › Pharmaceutical Science › Advanced Drug Delivery Systems
- Keywords
- nanoparticles, blood-brain barrier, brain drug delivery, nanoparticle size, anesthetic agents, anticancer agents, controlled drug release
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Biological Transport, Blood-Brain Barrier, Brain, Central Nervous System Agents, Humans, Drug Delivery Systems, Nanotechnology
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
