Role of nanocarriers and their surface modification in targeting delivery of bioactive compounds

The great interest in exploring substances from plants for therapeutic purposes is growing nowadays and will be more stimulated in the future. This is due to the harmful effects of chemical compounds and toxicity challenges. As a growing trend, around 80% of people worldwide rely on herbal medicines for some aspect of their primary health care needs. Despite global concepts on safety use for such a wide range of medications, some of them are still lack in clinic evidence. Most bioactive compounds present in either crude extract, fraction, or even as a single isolate, which shows poor bioavailability and need for a large dose to demonstrate biological actions. Like synthetic drugs, the lack of clinical outcome upon using bioactive agents due to poor bioavailability is a key challenge in the drug delivery area. The biological barriers are identified as a main hindrance to the successful target of therapeutic agents. Hence, strategies to encounter them are challenging and remain a big issue to bring the active compounds to the correct site of action within the body. Nanotechnology-based drug formulation for bioactive compounds is one of the recent successful approaches in this field. Several patents and commercial FDA-approved products in the global market confirm the promise of this technology. This chapter discuss different types of nanocarriers, particularly lipid-based systems, nanosuspensions, and the safety consideration design as well as the biokinetics and the challenges for clinical translation in the future.