Nanocelluloses as a Novel Vehicle for Controlled Drug Delivery

Nanocelluloses are an emerging type of natural nanomaterial with great potential in pharmaceutical and biomedical applications. There are four main types of nanocelluloses: spherical cellulose nanoparticles (SCNP), cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs), cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs), and bacterial cellulose (BC), all of which may be produced in suitable amounts at a reasonable cost. They possess unique properties such as biodegradability, recyclability, mechanical strength, low toxicity, and tunable amenability to a surface modification to impart new functionalities for selective targeting. They can be produced naturally from different sources (e.g., cotton, woods, agriculture residues) in adequate quantities, making them ideal materials for biomedical, pharmaceutical, and healthcare applications. Nanocelluloses possess a unique structural arrangement with their surface-exposed hydroxyl group, which can be used as anchoring points to install different targeting moieties to deliver the targeted cell therapeutics. This chapter discussed the uses of nanocelluloses and their composites to manufacture films, membranes, aerogels, hydrogels, and large-scale structures that already control the field of drug loading and release. The large surface area of the generated nanocellulose materials allows the delivery of high therapeutics payload to the targeted cells, minimizing the therapeutics’ undesirable side effects. Owing their properties to the high surface-area-to-volume ratio and the high polymerization of nanocellulose, it has the ability for pharmaceutical distribution systems, which have an excellent loading and binding capability for active pharmaceutical ingredients to monitor the release of drugs.