Chitin and chitosan as antitumour agents : A state-of-the-art mini review

Most of the cases, the tumour in human body causes uncontrollable cell growth and result of cancer. As per World Health Organization (WHO), cancer is the second most frequent cause of death due to disease after heart disease and it will be the cause of death for more than 10 million people in 2020. Therefore, one of the main research goals for researchers are to investigate of new antitumour agents. It is important to find new, powerful anticancer agents that may provide a therapeutic and diagnostic solution to speedy recovery from such diseases. Non biological materials such as chitin and chitosan are biopolymers which have exclusive structural possibilities for chemical and mechanical modifications to generate novel properties and functions. These biopolymers have excellent properties that make it suitable for their usage in various biological systems through drug delivery, tissue engineering, biosensing, drug formulation etc. and due to their unique biodegradability, biocompatibility and non-toxicity properties, they are excellent candidates for cancer cure or its diagnosis. This mini review highlights the numerous methodologies employed by the use of chitin and chitosan as an antitumour agent to fight against various types of cancer causing tumours and to provide a state-of-the-art overview in chitin chemistry.