Honors Theses
Date of Award
2016
Document Type
Undergraduate Thesis
Department
Pharmaceutics and Drug Delivery
First Advisor
Seongbong Jo
Relational Format
Dissertation/Thesis
Abstract
The purpose of the research conducted in this project was to add to a wealth of knowledge concerning chemotherapy. Although chemotherapy has been used since Paul Ehrlich's discover of Salvarsan's ability to kill Treponema pallidum (the bacterium that causes syphilis), today the term chemotherapy is mostly used in conjunction with cancer treatment. There have been many successful chemotherapy drugs produced throughout the years, but a constant problem with chemotherapy is the fact that it also affects noncancerous cells. The topic of this research investigated targeted drug delivery systems that incorporate paclitaxel, a hydrophobic chemotherapy drug. This research mainly focused on producing findings that work to stabilize drug delivery systems for paclitaxel while also allowing for its predictable release in a reduced environment that mimics a typical cancerous cell. The mixed micelle approach used Pluronic® poloxamers and redox-sensitive copolymers to create a drug delivery system that could interact with not only hydrophobic paclitaxel but also a hydrophilic aqueous environment that mimics the environment of a cancerous cell. The result of these redox-sensitive block copolymers is to produce an amphiphilic drug delivery system that will release paclitaxel upon interaction with a cancerous cell environment and not a healthy cell environment.
Recommended Citation
Portera, Mary Virginia, "Redox-sensitive Block Copolymer Nanoparticle Preparation and Characterization" (2016). Honors Theses. 659.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/659
Accessibility Status
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