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2. ADvANCes IN NANOTheRAPIesCancer treatment has made significant progress over the past few decades.However, despite the groundbreaking progress in this field, cancer remainsa very challenging disease to treat worldwide. The low success of clinicalcancer treatment approach is commonly pointed to chemotherapeutics lowretention in the tumor site and the induced multidrug resistance (MDR).These limitations have led to the exploration of more effective approachesparticularly in the field of nanotechnology in order to improve drug deliveryefficiency and reduce adverse effects.Nanotherapies leverage nanoscale materials to enhance drug delivery,improve therapeutics efficiency and reduce side effects, making them apromising avenue for alternative cancer treatment strategies. Nanocarrierbased drug delivery systems (NDDSs), such as polymeric micelles, liposomes,and nanoparticles, have been under the spotlight on cancer therapeuticsfield owing to their multiple advantages over the conventional therapeuticapproaches. Among the recognized benefits, NDDs allow to (i) improve anticancer drug stability and biocompatibility, enhancing pharmacokinetics; (ii)target therapies directly and selectively to tumor tissue, reducing systemictoxicity; (iii) release anti-cancer drugs in response to specific stimuli,promoting a controlled realized and improving therapeutic efficacy; (iv)overcome multidrug resistance, ultimately surpassing currentchemotherapeutic approaches limitations. To date, a number ofnanocarriers have been explored for chemotherapeutics delivery includingliposomes, nanoparticles, micelles and dendrimers.2.1. Nanodelivery of ChemotherapeuticsIn recent years, nanotherapies have significantly advanced the delivery ofchemotherapeutics. In contrast to conventional treatments, owing to theirnano-scale size, nanoparticles have shown promising potential to increaseanti-cancer drug efficiency due to their ability to protect anti-cancer agentsfrom enzymatic degradation while ensuring proper accumulation in tumortissue. In fact, besides the ability to encapsulate and transport drugs, eventhus with low solubility, increasing their stability in bloodstream circulationand improving their pharmacokinetics, nanocarrier systems have attractedresearchers%u2019 attention owing their ability to specifically target tumorcomponents such as cancer cells or tumor blood vessels. Such an approachis commonly achieved by exploiting the EPR effect to accumulate in cancertissue, and by functionalizing nanocarriers surface with targeting ligandson to promote their specificity for tumor key players, improving their105 Nanomaterial y NanomedicinaMar%u00eda Vallet , Antonio J. Salinas