Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles for Drug Delivery and Controlled Release Applications

This chapter describes the recent advances in the use of mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNPs) as drug delivery and controlled release systems. It reviews the more recent strategies developed to attain MSNPs capable of releasing molecules in the presence of inner stimuli, such as pH variations or presence of certain enzymes, biochemicals, or glutathione (GSH). The chapter then focuses on MSNPs as drug delivery systems (DDSs) able to respond to external stimuli, such as temperature, light, and magnetic fields. It explains the design of smart nanosystems that release drugs on demand and if possible operating through “on-off” switching mechanisms. Finally, the chapter describes multi-responsive controlled DDSs, which are those that are able to respond to more than one stimulus, either in an independent or in a synergistic fashion. Some of these smart drug delivery nanosystems have been designed to respond to two internal stimuli.