Natural polymers as excipients for drug delivery in Cancer Therapy

Natural polymers, especially polysaccharides, are currently attracting much attention for their fundamental properties for pharmaceutical applications due to their relatively low-cost, tunable functionality, biocompatibility, biodegradability, non-citotoxic effect. This book focuses on the state-of-art of natural polymers (cellulose and derivatives, hemicelluloses and chitosan) use as excipients in the formulation of drug delivery systems, mainly in nanoparticle drug delivery systems. Moreover, the state-of-art of these polymers (polysaccharides) in antitumor drugs delivery for cancer therapy has been reviewed and discussed.

Autorentext

Teresa Silva è una chimica, con un master in Chimica ambientale, principalmente nel campo del risanamento degli effluenti dell'industria della cellulosa. Ha conseguito il dottorato di ricerca in Agrochimica presso l'Università Federale di Viçosa, Minas Gerais, Brasile.