Abstract
Many agents used to treat cancer are toxic to normal tissues. Thus, treatments delivering drug specifically to tumour, while minimising exposure to normal tissue, may be advantageous over non-targeted treatments. The exquisite specificity of the immune system has been used successfully to help develop targeted anticancer agents. The most common (and successful) tissue-specific targeting strategies rely on antibody conjugates, but additional approaches, including targeting through cytokines, peptides and recombinant viruses, have also been used successfully. This review summarises the agents exploiting the immunological principles of target specificity to help maximise delivery to tumour while minimising collateral damage to normal tissues. Such targeted molecules are collectively referred to as immunoconjugates.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 87-103 |
| Number of pages | 17 |
| Journal | Expert Opinion on Drug Delivery |
| Volume | 5 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 2008 |
Funding
This work was supported by a grant from the German Research Foundation (DFG; WA 2524/1-1:1) to R Waehler; the National Institutes of Health (5P01 CA104177 and 1R01CA113454) to DT Curiel; and from the Max and Minnie Tomerlin Voelcker Fund and Rippel Foundation, and R01 FD003118 to TJ Curiel.
Keywords
- Cancer
- Cytotoxin
- Immunoconjugate
- Targeted drug delivery
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Pharmaceutical Science
