Nanotechnology for colorectal cancer detection and treatment

Figure 3 Inorganic and organic nanoparticles for cancer detection and therapy. The nanoparticles are divided into inorganic and organic nanoparticles. Inorganic nanoparticles, such as quantum dots, silica, carbon and metallic nanoparticles, are characterized by intrinsic electrical and optical properties suitable for cancer imaging, high stability and low biodegradability for theranostics. Organic nanoparticles, such as macromolecular assemblies or lipid-based nanoparticles, have lower stability but higher biocompatibility and multiple possibilities to add functional groups for drug delivery. Hybrid nanoparticles combine the qualities of both organic and inorganic nanoparticles to enhance their strength and biocompatibility. Citation: Briolay T, Petithomme T, Fouet M, Nguyen-Pham N, Blanquart C, Boisgerault N. Delivery of cancer therapies by synthetic and bio-inspired nanovectors. Mol Cancer 2021; 20: 55. Copyright© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Springer Nature. The authors have obtained the permission for figure using from the Springer Nature Publishing Group (Supplementary material).