Applications of Metallic Nanoparticles in Lung Cancer Treatment

With approximately 1.8 million deaths in 2020, lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death globally, contributing 18% to the total cancer deaths. Various treatment choices are followed for lung cancer, including surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy and targeted therapy. Therapeutic modality recommendations rely on many factors, such as the type and stage of cancer. Despite many developments in diagnosis and therapy made during previous years, the prognosis for patients with lung cancer is still dissatisfying. In recent years, the possible implementations of nanotechnology in diagnostics and therapeutic methods in clinical practice have noticeably changed, becoming exceptionally wide-ranging. Nanotechnology-based agents treat numerous human ailments, from degenerative to contagious diseases, specifically cancer. Different types of metallic nanoparticles have been developed, depicted by a favourable risk/reward ratio that leads to their introduction in clinical trials. Nanomedicine is a modern clinical medicine discipline that merges high specificity and selectivity in targeting tumour cells and low toxicity. Furthermore, in this discipline, metallic nanoparticles appear as attractive elements. In this chapter, recent metallic nanoparticles-based therapeutic agents developed are reviewed, with a specific focus on the possible implementations in clinical practice as anti-lung cancer agents, aiming their implementation to pave the way for a new golden era in oncology and a breakthrough in the battle against all types of cancers.