[Cancer chemotherapy utilizing nanotechnology].

Various attempts are under way to apply nanotechnology, in which remarkable progress has been made in recent years, to the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. For treating solid tumors, a system has been developed for more efficiently delivering nano-scale polymeric formulations to the tumors, utilizing the Enhanced Permeability and Retention( EPR)effect due to the characteristics of the tumor vascular system. Such nano-scale devices include a liposomal formulation, albumin-bound formulation and polymer micellar formulation, and each is currently under clinical development; some of these, such as doxorubicin-containing liposome(Doxyl), are already used in clinical practice. This paper describes the characterization of these nano-scale devices and ongoing clinical trials.