Emerging Strategies in Targeted and Smart Drug Delivery

Dear Colleagues,

The fundamental challenge in drug therapy has long been to deliver the right dose of a therapeutic agent specifically to the site of disease while minimizing exposure to healthy tissues, thereby maximizing efficacy and reducing side effects. Conventional drug delivery systems often fall short of this ideal, leading to suboptimal treatment outcomes and systemic toxicity. The field of targeted and smart drug delivery has emerged as a transformative paradigm to overcome these limitations. By leveraging advances in nanotechnology, biomaterials, molecular biology, and stimuli-responsive chemistry, researchers are engineering sophisticated carriers capable of navigating biological barriers, recognizing disease-specific signatures, and releasing their payload in a spatially, temporally, and dosage-controlled manner. This area is critically important for advancing treatment modalities across a wide spectrum of diseases, including cancer, neurological disorders, autoimmune conditions, and infectious diseases, heralding a new era of personalized and effective medicine.

This Special Issue aims to explore the latest advancements and emerging strategies in the field of targeted and smart drug delivery systems. Original research articles and comprehensive reviews are welcome in this Special Issue. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following themes:

• Nanoparticle-based drug delivery systems;
• Stimuli-responsive drug delivery technologies;
• Targeted delivery using ligands and antibodies;
• Advanced biomaterials for drug formulation;
• Integration of machine learning and AI in drug delivery optimization;
• Multi-functional drug delivery platforms for combination therapy;
• Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of targeted delivery systems;
• Long-acting formulations.

I look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Candace Day
Guest Editor

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