Ionic liquids as promising biomaterials: revolutionizing nano drug delivery systems

Abstract

Ionic liquids (ILs) have become versatile biomaterials due to their ability to overcome significant drawbacks of traditional pharmaceutical materials, including limited solubility, stability, and bioavailability, as they can have their polarity tuned, with low volatility and high thermal stability. Having evolved to become bioresponsive and self-assembly solvents, ILs are currently used as catalysts, stabilizers, surfactants, and active carriers of pharmaceutical ingredients, which places them as sustainable competitors to overcome important drug delivery and biomedical engineering barriers. This review discusses their synthesis, classification, and incorporation into nanocarriers, hydrogels, and polymeric matrices, with multifunctional applications in improving permeability, controlled release, and biocatalytic activity in a wide range of therapeutic applications, including oncology, diabetes, infectious diseases, and neurological disorders. The major issues such as cytotoxicity, viscosity, low biodegradability, and scalability are discussed and newer strategies of designing biocompatible and task-specific ILs by green chemistry and computational methods are considered. Overall, ILs will transform biomedical innovation by providing personalized and environmentally friendly platforms to deliver precision therapeutics, but further translation will need to be enhanced with safety verification measures, life-cycle analysis, and nanotechnology and smart biosensing. As rational molecular design and regulatory alignment continue to advance, ILs have high potential to transform the following generation of drug delivery and sustainable biomedicine.