While capsule pills are here to stay, generation nano-systems are an up-and-coming technology in the medical world, according to Dr. Meenakshi Arora, associate professor of Biomedical Sciences with the College of Community Health Sciences.
In understanding how drugs can help our body, it’s important to understand how we get sick in the first place, with the threshold phenomenon. “Everyone has a threshold in a deficiency state. If it surpasses the optimal threshold due to stressors, this can cause the body to become sick,” Arora said during a Mini Medical School presentation in January. Mini Medical School is a series of lectures provided each semester through a collaboration of UA’s OLLI program and CCHS.
The relationship between drugs and our bodies can be described with these two terms: pharmacodynamics, or what the drug does to the body; and pharmacokinetics, or what the body does to the drug. This relationship follows two patterns: administration, absorption, metabolism, distribution and effects (pharmacodynamics); and prescription, dose, concentration and effects (pharmacokinetics).
Polymers play an important role in drug design and delivery and Arora has worked heavily on novel synthetic methods for creating a library of next generation polymers. Polymers are large molecules made up of long chains or networks of smaller molecules. Natural polymers include hair and DNA, while synthetic polymers include polyester and polypropylene.
In further describing generation nano-systems, Arora shared that: first generation nano-systems can be described as better than the best; second generation nano-systems can precisely transfer receptor-specific nanoparticles for oral drug delivery; and third generation nano-systems are periodic functional polyesters.
Arora’s research is part of ongoing efforts to develop next generation drug delivery systems to treat currently untreatable diseases. In addition to her faculty position with CCHS, she is a researcher with UA’s Center for Convergent Bioscience and Medicine, which works to develop novel therapies for immune-inflammatory diseases by adopting an integrated approach to combining innovative drug delivery strategies with new drug-discovery and drug-repurposing.
The Mini Medical School program has been presented by CCHS faculty since 2016. It provides an opportunity for community learners to explore trends in medicine and health, and the lectures offer important information about issues and advances in medicine and research.