Lammers, Twan Gerardus Gertudis Maria

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Drug delivery research in Europe (editorial)

University of Twente Research Information

Journal of Controlled Release 161 (2012) 151Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirectJournal of Controlled Releasej ourna l homepage: www.e lsev ie r .com/ locate / jconre lEditorialDrug delivery research in EuropeTremendous advances have been made in the drug delivery fieldin the past few decades. In the early days of drug delivery research,i.e., in the 1950–1980s, the field was dominated by scientists workingon macro- and microscopic depot devices, which aimed to enablesustained and/or improved drug delivery upon implantation, inges-tion or topical administration. From the 1980s onwards, based onthe magic bullet concept (proposed by Paul Ehrlich in 1905) and onthe Enhanced Permeability and Retention effect (first described byMaeda and colleagues in 1986), advances in chemical and pharma-ceutical engineering, in bio- and nanotechnology, and in genetic andmolecular medicine rapidly fueled growth in drug delivery systemsfor systemic drug targeting, aiming to more efficiently and more spe-cifically target i.v. administered (chemo-) therapeutic agents to path-ological sites, to thereby improve the balance between their efficacyand their toxicity.The drug delivery field has grown exponentially in the last 20 years.This is exemplified by Fig. 1, which shows that up until 1990, onlyabout a 1000 “drug delivery” papers could be retrieved in Web of Sci-ence. Ever since, however, the field has started to grow at an ever-increasing pace, and especially from 2005 onwards, a huge increase inthenumber of papers publishedper year can be observed. The total num-ber of drug delivery papers published worldwide currently is ~99,000,and it therefore is highly likely that somewhere in 2012, the magical100,000 mark will be surpassed. Fig. 1 furthermore exemplifies thatwhen it comes to the number of publications per continent, there isnot much of a difference between North America, Europe and Asia. Inall three continents, thousands of scientists and hundreds of researchgroups are working on the development of novel systems and strategiesfor drug delivery and drug targeting, and this is currently resulting inseveral thousands of papers published per continent per year.Fig. 1. Number of publications on “Drug delivery” listed in Web of Science.0168-3659/$ – see front matter © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.jconrel.2012.05.019Another aspect of drug delivery research that has tremendously ex-panded over the years is the number of applications for which deliverysystems and targeting strategies are being developed. In the early days,they were almost exclusively focused on genetic disorders and cancer,but in recent years, also inflammatory, metabolic and organ-specificdisorders have been attracting significant attention. Furthermore, as aresult of advances innanotechnology and in chemical andpharmaceuticalengineering, ever more carrier materials are nowadays being employedfor drug delivery purposes, including besides liposomes, polymers, pro-teins and micelles, e.g. also various different types of nanoparticles, nan-otubes, nanorods, nanobullets, nanospheres and nanoshells.Ever since its inception in 1984, the Journal of Controlled Release(JCR) has been a leading forum for showcasing advances in the drugdelivery field. Initially focusing primarily on sustained drug releasefrom implantable or injectable depot devices, the scope of the Journalhas expanded considerably over the years. JCR now covers not onlydrug delivery systems, drug release mechanisms and drug targetingstrategies, but also biological properties of drugs, bioactive polymersand hydrogels, tissue engineering, molecular and functional imaging,gene therapy and nanomedicine.In the present issue, in an attempt to comprehensively summarizethe progress made in the drug delivery field in the last couple ofyears, 50 leading European reseachers and/or research teams describethe advances made in their respective areas of expertise. The areas cov-ered are as diverse as the drug delivery field itself, addressing differentcarrier materials, different targeting strategies and different diseases, aswell as biotechnological, nanotoxicological, immunological, methodo-logical and economical aspects. This issue therefore serves as a Europe-an benchmark for furthering, fostering and fine-tuning drug deliveryresearch worldwide.Twan LammersRWTHAachenUniversity andHelmholtz Institute for Biomedical Engineering,Department of Experimental Molecular Imaging, Aachen, GermanyUniversity of Twente and MIRA Institute for Biomedical Technologyand Technical Medicine, Department of Targeted Therapeutics, Enschede,The NetherlandsUtrecht University and Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences,Department of Pharmaceutics, Utrecht, The NetherlandsE-mail address: tlammers@ukaachen.de.

Drug delivery research in Europe (editorial)

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