Dendrimer

A dendrimer is a spherical, highly branched polymer molecule. Dendrimers are made from two different monomers – a reactive amine and an acrylic acid – and are assembled in discrete steps, which allow them to be constructed with an exact size that depends on the number of enlargement steps. This picture shows a dendrimer that has undergone three “generations” of enlargements.
Dendrimers are of particular interest for cancer applications because of their defined and reproducible size, but more importantly, because it is easy to add a variety of other molecules to the surface of a dendrimer. Such molecules could include tumor-targeting agents (including but not restricted to monoclonal antibodies), imaging contrast agents to pinpoint tumors, drug molecules for delivery to a tumor, and reporter molecules that might detect if an anticancer drug is working.