Glycyrrhetinic acid as a hepatocyte targeting unit for an anticancer drug delivery system with enhanced cell type selectivity.

ABSTRACT

Herein, we report the potential of glycyrrhetinic acid (GA) as an active targeting ligand for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) for the development of diagnosis/therapy using small-molecule based approaches. Our preliminary results demonstrated that GA-conjugation to diagnostic/therapeutic counterparts significantly enhanced their HCC targeting ability and excellent therapeutic efficacy.