Nanomedicine for Treatment of Acute Lung Injury and Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome

Sadikot, Ruxana T.; Kolanjiyil, Arun V.; Kleinstreuer, Clement; Rubinstein, Israel

In ALI, intrinsic surfactants are inactivated via albumin leakage and other potential mechanisms. Currently, existing intratracheal surfactants have not proven to be beneficial. By employing novel nanovesicle aerosols of nonlamellar lipids of surfactant, Kaviratna and Banerjee [58] showed that nanopreparation improved the resistance of pulmonary surfactants to inhibition. Further, they showed that nanovesicle aerosols of surfactant were effective in acid-induced lung injury. These represent a novel nanotechnology-based noninvasive therapeutic strategy in ALI and other pulmonary conditions where leakage of inflammatory inhibitor agents forms a major component of the pathophysiology. In a recent study, Zhu et al. [59] developed novel dimethyl silicone dry nanoemulsion inhalations (DSNIs) for pulmonary delivery. The DSNIs showed significantly higher anti-ALI effect on the ALI rat models than the blank DSNIs and the dimethyl silicone aerosols. More recently, Ravikumar et al. [60] developed nanocarrier-based gene therapy to upregulate the expression of pulmonary erythropoietin receptor in an animal model of hyperoxic lung injury. Inhalation delivery resulted in mitigation of acute oxidative lung damage. Together, these studies suggest that aerosolized or inhalational administration of nanocarrierbased therapies may prove to be effective at remedying lung injury.