The importance of Dendrimers in the Pharmaceutical Uses

VERONICA BRUNETTI; MARISA MARTINELLI; MIRIAM C. STRUMIA; VIJAY KUMAR THAKUR

Handbook of Polymers for Pharmaceutical Technologies?,

wiley

Año: 2015; p. 1 - 30

The development of molecular nanostructures with well-defined particle shapes and sizes, such as dendrimers and dendritic structures, are of great importance since they could be interesting building blocks for the preparation of new nanomaterials. The unique properties of dendritic macromolecules make them much more useful for biomedical and pharmaceutical applications than linear polymers. Therefore, over the last three decades, dendritic polymers have therefore found a special place in polymer pharmaceutical technology. This chapter describes the general characteristics of dendrimers, synthetic methodologies and the properties that give them interesting applications in pharmaceutical and biomedical application. Finally, some characteristic examples of the use of dendrimers in these fields are presented.