Table 1.

Nanoformulations of anticancer agents for skin cancer along with their outcomes.

Carrier System	Therapeutic Agents	Drawbacks of Drugs in the Treatment of Skin Cancer	Particle Size (nm)	Zeta Potential (mV)	Remarks	Ref.
Liposomes	Vincristine	Possess a rapid clearance rate, have a large volume of distribution in the body, and dose-related neurotoxicity	103.6 ± 0.6	−2.3 ± 0.1	Enhanced stability, superior antitumor efficacy, and reduction in toxicity	[79]
Niosomes	Lycopene	Lycopene is sensitive to light and heat and undergoes oxidation when stored. It limits the activity of lycopene	223 ± 8	−2.1 ± 1.2	With enhanced penetration, the activity of lycopene was prevented, and bioavailability increased.	[80,81]
Transferosomes	Paclitaxel	Low solubility, low permeability, and upon exceeding the dose, causes hypersensitivity reaction	200.0	−26.0	Increased permeability and stability, the better release of drug	[82]
Ethosomes	Sulforaphane	Poor physiochemical properties and skin permeation	227 ± 3	−26 ± 1	Enhanced skin permeation	[83]
Transethosomes	5-Fluorouracil	Low bioavailability and rapid degradation when given orally	57.0	−46.19 ± 15.3	Elevated efficacy and controlled release	[67,68]
Solid Lipid NPs	Doxorubicin (Dox)	Nonspecific distribution-related side effects are cardiotoxicity, oral ulceration alopecia, and myelosuppression	92 ± 2.0	0.044 ± 0.007	Maximized efficacy, enhanced stability, and absence of cytotoxicity in untargeted organs	[84]
Nanostructured lipid carriers	Resveratrol	Lowers blood sugar level on chronic use, physiochemical instability	191 ± 5.20	−10.00 ± 0.30	Enhanced epidermal deposition and site-specific release of drug	[85]
Natural NPs	Quercetin	Lower stability, Low solubility, conventional formulation requires a higher dose (1500 mg) for an acceptable therapeutic level, and when given orally, it shows low absorption	228.77 ± 2.0	−16.7	Enhanced localized action, dose requirement reduced to 100 mg, stability and solubility improved.	[86]
Synthetic NPs	Paclitaxel	BCS class Ⅳ drug that shows low permeability and low solubility; side effect includes hypotension, lethargy, neurotoxicity, and nephrotoxicity	146 ± 2.0	0.12 ± 3.6	Antitumor activity of paclitaxel improved, and endothelium targeting of the tumor was achieved.	[66]
Dendrimers	Fluoroisothiocynate	Conventional intravenous administration causes difficulty breathing, cardiac arrhythmia, dizziness, severe pain in the arm, and sweating.	14.45 ± 0.8	13.94 ± 1.5	Dendrimers localize at the targeted site. After iontophoretic delivery of dendrimer, the amount of dendrimer in the epidermis was 3-fold high, and degradation of the enzyme was prevented.	[87,88]
Nanogels	Curcumin	Low stability and low aqueous solubility limit its clinical application.	--	−21.6	Better penetration across the skin and higher cytotoxic activity when compared to conventional pure curcumin.
PEG-NPs	Curcumin	Low stability and low aqueous solubility limit its clinical application	167.60 ± 15.12	−26.91	Higher drug release when compared to free curcumin suspension, MTT assays of nanoformulations showed higher efficacy when compared to conventional curcumin suspension	[89]
Nanoemulsions	5-fluorouracil	Rapid G.I. degradation when given orally and inadequate bioavailability	68.20 ± 2.65	−25.92	The nanoemulsion was found to be much more productive than free 5-fluorouracil formulation and IC50 the value reported as 398 µM	[90]
Nanofibres	Resveratrol	Physical instability and chemical instability	15.9 ± 10.0	Porosity 90.69%	Permeation across the skin enhanced, a percentage of cell viability of about 37.2% at 500 µg/mL was observed, and increased cytotoxicity activity found	[91]
Metallic NPs	Trapa natans extract	Physiochemical instability	30–90	-----------	100 µg/mL concentration of formulation reduces the cell viability of A431 skin cancer cells to 24.3%	[92]