As a research field, nanomedicine has exploded over the last several decades, with potential to revolutionize the way we detect and treat diseases. With the ability to design nanotherapeutics to target tissues, release drugs at specific times, improve drug solubility, or recognize biomarkers, they represent one of the next generation of pharmaceuticals for more personalized treatment. However, compared to traditional pharmaceuticals, the clinical translation of nanomedicine remains challenging. Hurdles to translation include the lack of reproducibility in the scientific literature, poorly designed studies, challenging manufacturing and scale-up, safety issues, and regulatory barriers. In this session organized by the Canadian Chapter of the Controlled Release Society, researchers on the forefront nanomedicine research will provide an overview of this topic alongside examples of some promising translatable nanotechnologies.
This is a pivotal point in the field of nanomedicine and a consolidation of knowledge from experts in the field will be especially timely for accelerating the progress of the translation of nanomedicines.
Evaluation of Iron Species in Healthy Subjects Treated with Generic and Reference Sodium Ferric Gluconate
James Polli (University of Maryland, USA)
Opportunities, Barriers, and a Strategy for Overcoming Translational Challenges to Therapeutic Nucleic Acid Nanotechnology
Kirill Afonin (The University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA)
Ceramide nanoliposomes: the road to the clinic
Mark Kester (Nanostar Institute Virginia, USA)
The IRICoR solution in drug discovery
Nadine Beauger (IRICoR, Canada)
1) Understand the current development of nanotechnologies for biomedical applications
2) Recognize the barriers preventing nanomedicine from clinical translation
3) Give examples of strategies to bridge the translational gap of such technologies