Blood–brain barrier and laser technology for drug brain delivery

Abstract

Here, we discuss an important problem in medicine as development of effective strategies for brain drug delivery. This problem is related to the blood–brain barrier (BBB), which is a “customs” controlling the entrance of different molecules from blood into the brain protecting the normal function of central nervous system (CNS). We show three interfaces of anatomical side of BBB and two functional types of BBB — physical and transporter barriers. Although this protective mechanism is essential for health of CNS, it also creates a hindrance to the entry of drugs into the brain. The BBB was discovered over 100 years ago but till now, there is no effective methods for brain drug delivery. There are more than 70 approaches for overcoming BBB including physical, chemical and biological techniques but all of these tools have limitation to be widely used in clinical practice due to invasiveness, challenge in performing, very costly or limitation of drug concentration. Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is usual clinical method of surgical navigation for the resection of brain tumor and anti-cancer therapy. Nowadays, the application of PDT is considered as a potential promising tool for brain drug delivery via opening of BBB. Here, we show the first successful experimental results in this field discussing the adventures and disadvantages of PDT-related BBB disruption as well as alternatives to overcome these limitations and possible mechanisms with new pathways for brain clearance via glymphatic and lymphatic systems.

Keywords

• Blood–brain barrier
• laser technologies
• photodynamic therapy
• brain drug delivery