Optimization of Extracellular Vesicle Release for Targeted Drug Delivery

IEEE Trans Nanobioscience. 2024 Jan;23(1):109-117. doi: 10.1109/TNB.2023.3287637. Epub 2024 Jan 3.

Abstract

Targeted drug delivery is a promising approach for many serious diseases, such as glioblastoma multiforme, one of the most common and devastating brain tumor. In this context, this work addresses the optimization of the controlled release of drugs which are carried by extracellular vesicles. Towards this goal, we derive and numerically verify an analytical solution for the end-to-end system model. We then apply the analytical solution either to reduce the disease treatment time or to reduce the amount of required drugs. The latter is formulated as a bilevel optimization problem, whose quasiconvex/quasiconcave property is proved here. For solving the optimization problem, we propose and utilize a combination of bisection method and golden-section search. The numerical results demonstrate that the optimization can significantly reduce the treatment time and/or the required drugs carried by extracellular vesicles for a therapy compared to the steady state solution.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Brain Neoplasms* / drug therapy
  • Drug Delivery Systems
  • Extracellular Vesicles*
  • Glioblastoma* / drug therapy
  • Humans