About this Research Topic

Background

Drug development is extremely important in various fields. It is a gradual process containing the procedures from drug synthesis and drug delivery to drug assays. However, traditional methods are still difficult to meet future requirements because they are expensive, time-consuming, and technical complications. Although thousands of potential drug candidates can be discovered and identified each year, the final approval to the market is only a tiny number. Therefore, new tools and approaches are urgently needed to guide new drug development. Several strategies can be exploited to overcome these problems to some extent. For example, developing high-throughput platforms would be a straightforward way for drug synthesis, screening, and evaluation. Recapitulation of a systematic and realistic model of the human body can better predict the performance of drug candidates. Controlled delivery of drugs would enhance drug targeting ability, blood circulation time, and reduce side effects.

Microfluidics is one of the most promising tools for this research compared to conventional drug development processes. It has massive intrinsic advantages like miniaturization, small sample consumption, low cost of operation, more flexibility, and a highly controlled environment for drug synthesis and drug delivery system fabrication. Microfluidic technologies can precisely control the drug dosage and concentration on molecular and cellular levels. Moreover, it also offers the ability to mimic in vivo-like conditions, either in normal or disease status, and is compatible with several analytical strategies for high throughput drug screening and evaluations. Mass spectrometry (MS) has been widely applied in drug discovery, including compound library screening, hit validation, and lead optimization against protein and nucleic acid targets. Specifically, the unique role of native MS in drug discovery lies in its capability as a powerful and versatile biophysical method for analyzing protein−small molecule interactions. By detecting intact protein−ligand complexes, native MS can be used to define ligand binding stoichiometry and specificity, quantify dissociation constants, and investigate the mechanism of action of drugs.

We encourage the submissions of original research articles and reviews that focus on, but are not limited to, the following potential topics:
• Microfluidics for drug synthesis and screening
• Microfluidic fabrication of drug carriers, including microparticles and nanoparticles
• Drug metabolism study using microfluidics
• Organs-on-chips for drug evaluation
• Protein–drug interactions using native mass spectrometry in drug discovery

Please note: Frontiers in Experimental Pharmacology and Drug Discovery does not accept publication studies carried out with crude extracts or mixtures. Only the use of highly purified, chemically characterized compounds is acceptable.
Whenever a complex mixture is used, data with the single components of the mixture, in precisely defined dose/concentration, should be provided (and/or previously published). Studies including traditional Chinese medicine remedies can be considered only if carried out with pure individual compounds.

Keywords: microfluidics, mass spectrometry, droplet-microfluidics, organs-on-chips, drug synthesis and screening, drug delivery, drug evaluation

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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