Nanomedicine and brain tumors treatment

Malignant brain tumors represent a class of aggressive neoplasms generally associated with high rates of morbidity and mortality. Late diagnosis and the limitation of conventional therapies, which may result from inefficient delivery of the therapeutic or contrast agent to brain tumors are major reasons for this unsolved clinical problem. Recent advances in our understanding of molecular genetic and tumor biology have lead to a new class of modern antitumoral agents. Consequently, new tools have emerged to target molecules in specific signaling pathways with the objective to increase efficacy and reduce toxicity. Nanotechnology involves the design, synthesis, and characterization of materials and devices that have a functional organization in at least one dimension on the nanometer scale. The nanoparticles have emerged as a potential vector for brain delivery able to overcome the difficulties of modern strategies. Nanoparticle systems provide prolonged drug delivery directly to the tumor following direct intracerebral injection or by functionalizing the material surface with peptides and ligands allowing the drug-loaded material to be specifically target the tumor cells. In this chapter, we will first describe the principal events in glioma biology. We will then report about the applications of nanotechnologies tumor treatment. Finally, we will report various experiences of preclinical and/or clinical studies in cerebral gliomas treatment. © 2012 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. All rights are reserved.