Abstract
The recent diversification of modalities in drug discovery has been remarkable, and not only small molecule drugs and biopharmaceuticals but also oligonucleotide therapeutics and antibody-drug conjugates have been actively developed. Cell therapeutics is one of new drug modalities used in cell-based therapy, in which living cells are transplanted into patients, and has demonstrated the excellent therapeutic effects against various diseases including refractory diseases. On the other hand, the efficacy and safety of cell therapeutics are not still reliable and these issues need to be resolved for accelerating the development of cell therapeutics. In recent years, the technology of drug delivery system （DDS）, which is a methodology to optimize the therapeutic efficacy and safety of drugs, has been applied to cell therapeutics for the purpose of improving their efficacy and safety. In addition, the application of DDS technology to cell therapeutics opens the new cell-based therapy. In this article, we summarize the cell therapeutics that has been approved in Japan and review the recent findings of cell therapeutics loaded with DDS technology.
