Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Active transcytosis and new opportunities for cancer nanomedicine

Nature Materials volume 19, pages 478–480 (2020)Cite this article

Subjects

New evidence suggests that the mechanism of nanoparticle entry into solid tumours may be driven by an active process. This insight paves the way for approaches to enhance the efficiency of nanomedicine delivery by harnessing active transport mechanisms, and encourage researchers to rethink how tumours are treated.

The molecular and cellular mechanisms of nanoparticle delivery into solid tumours under in vivo physiological conditions have been a topic of considerable interest and controversy in the field of cancer nanomedicine1. A commonly accepted mechanism for nanoparticle tumour delivery is based on the enhanced retention and permeability (EPR) effect2, in which enhanced permeability arises from the leaky vasculature and fenestration of tumour blood vessels, and increased nanoparticle retention results from a collapse of the tumour lymphatic drainage system. However, recent data analysis reveals that perhaps less than 1% of the administrated nanoparticle dose could actually reach solid tumours in animal models3. This low level of delivery efficiency, together with the disappointing clinical trials of nanotherapeutic drugs, has dampened the initial excitement for clinical translation4.

This is a preview of subscription content

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Fig. 1: Active and passive mechanisms for in vivo nanoparticle delivery.

References

  1. Chan, W. C. W. Acc. Chem. Res. 50, 627–632 (2017).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Nakamura, H., Jun, F. & Maeda, H. Expert Opin. Drug Deliv. 12, 53–64 (2015).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Wilhelm, S. et al. Nat. Rev. Mater 1, 16014 (2016).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Shi, J., Kantoff, P., Wooster, R. & Farokhzad, O. C. Nat. Rev. Cancer 17, 20–37 (2017).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Sindhwani, S. et al. Nat. Mater. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-019-0566-2 (2020).

  6. Hobbs, S. K. et al. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 95, 4607–4612 (1998).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Schnitzer, J. E. Am. J. Physiol. Heart Circ. Physiol. 262, H246–H254 (1992).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Dvorak, H. F., Nagy, J. A., Dvorak, J. T. & Dvorak, A. M. Am. J. Pathol. 133, 95–109 (1988).

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Oh, P. et al. Nat. Med. 20, 1062–1068 (2014).

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Liu, Y. et al. Nano Lett. 19, 8010–8020 (2019).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Detampel, P. et al. PloS ONE 14, e0223339 (2019).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Ayloo, S. & Gu, C. Curr. Opinion Neurobiol. 57, 32–38 (2019).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Wiley, D. T., Webster, P., Gale, A. & Davis, M. E. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 110, 8662–8667 (2013).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Zhou, Q. et al. Nat. Nanotechnol. 14, 799–809 (2019).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Ruan, G., Agrawal, A., Marcus, A. I. & Nie, S. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 129, 14759–14766 (2007).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Ruoslahti, E. Adv. Drug Deliv. Rev. 110–111, 3–12 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Schmid, D. et al. Nat. Commun. 8, 1747 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Ledford, H. Nature 497, 544–544 (2013).

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Syn, N. L., Teng, M. W. L., Mok, T. S. K. & Soo, R. A. Lancet Oncol. 18, e731–e741 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Jiang, W. et al. Nat. Biomed. Eng. 1, 0029 (2017).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Reinhard, K. et al. Science 367, 446–453 (2020).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Sahin, U. et al. Nature 547, 222–226 (2017).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Yuan, H. et al. Nat. Nanotechnol. 12, 763–769 (2017).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Chen, Q. et al. Nat. Commun. 7, 13193 (2016).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Kulkarni, A. et al. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 113, E2104–E2113 (2016).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA

    Subehndu Pandit & Shuming Nie

  2. Department of Bioengineering, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA

    Debapriya Dutta & Shuming Nie

Authors
  1. Subehndu Pandit
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Debapriya Dutta
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Shuming Nie
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shuming Nie.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Pandit, S., Dutta, D. & Nie, S. Active transcytosis and new opportunities for cancer nanomedicine. Nat. Mater. 19, 478–480 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-020-0672-1

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-020-0672-1

Further reading

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing