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Drugs have to overcome numerous barriers to reach their desired therapeutic targets. In several cases drugs, especially the highly lipophilic molecules, suffer from low solubility and bioavailability and therefore their desired targeting is
hampered. In addition, undesired metabolic products might be produced or off-targets could be recognized. Along these
lines, nanopharmacology has provided new technological platforms, to overcome these boundaries. Specifically, numerous
vehicle platforms such as cyclodextrins and calixarenes have been widely utilized to host lipophilic drugs such as antagonists of the angiotensin II AT1 receptor (AT1R), as well as quercetin and silibinin. The encapsulation of these drugs in supramolecules or other systems refines their solubility and metabolic stability, increases their selectivity and therefore decreases their effective dose and improves the therapeutic index. In this minireview we report on the formulations of Silibinin
and AT1R antagonist candesartan in a 2-HP-β-cyclodextrin host molecule, which displayed enhanced cytotoxicity and increased silibinin’s and candesartan’s stability, respectively. Moreover we describe the encapsulation of quercetin in gold nanoparticles bearing a calixarene supramolecular host. Also the encapsulation of temozolomide in a calixarene nanocapsule
has been described. Finally, we report on the activity enhancement that has been achieved upon using these formulations as
well as the analytical and computational methods we used to characterize these formulations and explore the molecular interactions between the host and quest molecules.
