Funcionalización de nanopartículas con el neuropéptido VIP como estrategia de mejora de su potencial de aplicación en biomedicina

Resumen

Nanotechnology can address key bottlenecks hindering successful bench to bedside translation of recent research in the development of neuropeptide-based drugs. Studies of the effects of VIP on several biological functions provide a powerful rationale for the assessment of VIP as a novel therapeutic approach for the synthesis of novel nano-systems that could improve the efficacy of the treatment. The fact that VIP is so attractive for therapeutic use by itself leads to the study of nano-applications such as a peptide delivery system which may solve the problem of drug break-down by digestive acids and enzymes before they reach their targets. The half-life of VIP needs to be substantially prolonged in biological fluids to be employed in therapeutics with increased effectiveness, as VIP-based drug design is hampered by the instability of the peptide and has limited bioavailability. In other applications VIP is used as a surface ligand for targeted delivery. In this case, VIP needs to be efficiently attached to the nanoparticle surface.