How do carbon nanotubes prove beneficial in medical health care?

CNTs are best fitted for controlled drug delivery due to their small size and hollow interior  

CNTs are nanosized, biocompatible, easy to functionalize, and have excellent optical and thermal properties. CNTs could be effectively uptake by different cells through different cellular uptake mechanisms. CNTs have wide applications in drug delivery and diagnostics, such as gene therapies, phototherapy, controlled release, and targeted applications in several diseases. This could be useful to reduce toxicity and off-target effects and increase the efficacy of the nanotherapeutics and biotherapeutics.

In preclinical settings, carbon nanotubes have been successfully used for drug and gene delivery applications and also as biosensors. Their applications are mainly attributed to their size, high penetration capability, and ease of synthesis. However, before their bench-to-bedside translation, it is extremely important to study their fate in vivo, since conventional testing may not be sufficient enough to study their kinetics and dynamics in the human body. 

How do carbon nanotubes prove beneficial in medical health care?

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are currently researched for medical healthcare, more specifically in the areas of (1) drug delivery and (2) biosensing, for health monitoring or disease treatment. These CNTs applications are potentially revolutionizing medicine. For example, the functionalized single-walled carbon nanotubes have proven an enhanced solubility. Furthermore, these specific SWCNTs allow an efficient tumor targeting/drug delivery, while preventing the cytotoxicity or altering the immune cells’ function.

 

The CNTs drug delivery vehicles have shown encouraging results in targeting specific cancer cells with a lower dose than conventional drugs used, but just as effective in killing the cells, moreover without harming the healthy cells and significantly reduces side effects.

 

The CNTs based blood glucose biosensing/monitoring methods in diabetic patients take advantage of their super-small size. Moreover, the high electrochemically accessible surface area, the high electrical conductivity and the beneficial structural properties have shown the potential use of the SWNTs and the multi-walled nanotubes (MWNTs) in highly sensitive noninvasive glucose sensors. 

In contrast to traditional medications, CNTs' tiny size enables them to deliver lower dosages of medication to targeted disease cells in the body, decreasing side effects and damage to healthy cells. It enhances the disease cell targeting effectiveness due to its small dimensions.