Silk fibroin carriers with sustained release capacity for treating neurological diseases

Xinqi Huang; Yumei An; Shengye Yuan; Chen Chen; Haiyan Shan; Mingyang Zhang

doi:10.3389/fphar.2023.1117542

Silk fibroin carriers with sustained release capacity for treating neurological diseases

Front Pharmacol. 2023 May 5:14:1117542. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2023.1117542. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Xinqi Huang¹, Yumei An¹, Shengye Yuan¹, Chen Chen², Haiyan Shan³, Mingyang Zhang¹

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Forensic Sciences, Suzhou Medical College, Soochow University, Suzhou, China.
² Department of Orthopedics, Dongtai People's Hospital, Dongtai, China.
³ Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, The Affiliated Suzhou Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Suzhou, China.

Abstract

Neurological diseases such as traumatic brain injury, cerebral ischemia, Parkinson's, and Alzheimer's disease usually occur in the central and peripheral nervous system and result in nervous dysfunction, such as cognitive impairment and motor dysfunction. Long-term clinical intervention is necessary for neurological diseases where neural stem cell transplantation has made substantial progress. However, many risks remain for cell therapy, such as puncture bleeding, postoperative infection, low transplantation success rate, and tumor formation. Sustained drug delivery, which aims to maintain the desired steady-state drug concentrations in plasma or local injection sites, is considered as a feasible option to help overcome side effects and improve the therapeutic efficiency of drugs on neurological diseases. Natural polymers such as silk fibroin have excellent biocompatibility, which can be prepared for various end-use material formats, such as microsphere, gel, coating/film, scaffold/conduit, microneedle, and enables the dynamic release of loaded drugs to achieve a desired therapeutic response. Sustained-release drug delivery systems are based on the mechanism of diffusion and degradation by altering the structures of silk fibroin and drugs, factors, and cells, which can induce nerve recovery and restore the function of the nervous system in a slow and persistent manner. Based on these desirable properties of silk fibroin as a carrier with sustained-release capacity, this paper discusses the role of various forms of silk fibroin-based drug delivery materials in treating neurological diseases in recent years.

Keywords: TBI; drug delivery; neurological diseases; silk fibroin; sustained release; traumatic brain injury.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 82071382, No. 81601306); The Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD); Jiangsu 333 High Level Talent Training Project (2022); The Jiangsu Maternal and Child Health Research Key Project (F202013); Jiangsu Talent Youth Medical Program (QNRC2016245); Shanghai Key Lab of Forensic Medicine (KF2102); Suzhou Science and Technology Development Project (SYS2020089); The Fifth Batch of Gusu District Health Talent Training Project (GSWS2019060); Undergraduate Extracurricular Academic Research Project (KY20220012Z).