1. Nanotechnology Application in Saudi Arabia 1st International RMH Pharmacy Conference 28-30th April Dr. Al Omar King Saud University

2. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Saudi Arabia plans to set up a nanotechnology institutes and centers of Excellency. Saudi Arabia aims to establish itself as a regional leader in nanotechnology research in a bid to lessen its dependency on oil.
Strategically this is very important technology for Saudi Arabia.
28 April 2008
Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

3. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
WHY
It is the use of nanotechnology in the petrochemicals industry that believes will have the biggest impact on the country's economy.
The decision makers (Ministry of higher education, KACST, and Minstry of Finance) build this strategy.
28 April 2008
Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

4. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
In Saudi Arabia
Nanoscience and nanotechnology programmes in KSA, in general, are in three fields; solar power, water desalination and petrochemical applications.
In the area of water treatment, research will focus on the use of new nano-membrane materials for reverse osmosis seawater desalination.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

5. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Some Achievements
IBM and KACST (King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology) have announced a multi-year agreement to develop nanotechnology for use in the Kingdom's energy and water sectors.
IBM has an advanced nanotech-program called millipede, which is concerned with data storage using this technology.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

6. Some Achievements cont…
KACST (King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology) have announced a multi-year agreement to develop nanotechnology for use in the Kingdom's energy and water sectors. IBM has an advanced nanotech-program called millipede, which is concerned with data storage using this technology. KAUST is a new world-class, graduate-level research institution and that is pursuing global collaborations.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

7. Some Achievements cont…
KSU (King Saud University) has started on 26th of March a project with CEA-France (the commission of atomic energy) to develop a Fuel Cell using nanotechnology.
In addition to the above expected applications, King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals (KFUPM) fosters and supports nanotechnology research in the areas of Materials, Membranes, Nanobiotenology and Nanophotonics that serve the strategic needs of Saudi Arabia in energy, environment and advanced materials.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

8. Some Achievements cont…
Saudi Aramco is leading the way in nanotechnology. EXPEC ARC (Advanced Research Centre) organised the industry’s first Society of Petroleum Engineers nanotechnology gathering. The Applied Technology Workshop (ATW) was held in February under the title 'Nanotechnology in Upstream E&P: Nanoscale Revolutions to Mega-scale Challenges?.
Fascinatingly, Aramco is interested in medical application of nanotechnology.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

9. Some Achievements cont…
Last year, Saudi Aramco’s EXPEC ARC introduced the concept of Resbots, or reservoir robots - tiny nanorobots less than 1/100th the width of a human hair - that could one day be deployed like an army in reservoirs through injected water. During their journey, they would analyse the reservoir pressure, temperature and fluid type, storing information in onboard memory. A number of them then would be retrieved from crude oil at the producing wells to download that information, thus effectively mapping the reservoir.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

10. The present and future of nanotechnology in pharmaceutical care
Applications of nanotechnology to medicine and physiology imply materials and devices designed to interact with the body at subcellular (i.e., molecular) scales with a high degree of specificity.
This can be potentially translated into targeted cellular and tissue-specific clinical applications designed to achieve maximal therapeutic efficacy with minimal side effects. (Nanomedicine: Nanotechnology, Biology, and Medicine 3 (2007) 20– 31)
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

11. The present and future of nanotechnology in pharmaceutical care cont…
Recently, Sahoo et al. introduced the chief scientific and technical aspects of nanotechnology, and some of its potential clinical applications.
Including the development of nanoparticles for drug and
gene delivery and diagnostics.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

12. The present and future of nanotechnology in pharmaceutical care cont…
In USA, the Department of Energy receives $211 million. While the National Institutes of Health meanwhile spend $89 million on nanotechnology in 2005, including nearly $30 million for the National Cancer Institute’s new Alliance for Nanotechnology in Cancer, a 5-year program announced in last September.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

13. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Applications of nanotechnology
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

14. Nanotechnology in drug delivery
From nanotechnology there is only one step to nanomedicine, which may be defined as the monitoring, repair, construction, and control of human biological systems at the molecular level, using engineered nanodevices and nanostructures.
Moghimi SM, Hunter AC, Murray JC. Nanomedicine: current status and future prospects. FASEB J 2005;19:
Emerich DF. Nanomedicine—prospective therapeutic and diagnostic
applications. Expert Opin Biol Ther 2005;5:1 - 5.
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

15. Nanotechnology in drug delivery cont..
13% of the current global pharmaceutical market is related to the sale of products that include a drug delivery system.
The final aim of pharmaceutical research is the delivery of any drug at the right time in a safe and reproducible manner to a specific target at the required level.
Mazzola L. Commercializing nanotechnology. Nat Biotechnol 2003; 21:
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

16. Nanotechnology in drug delivery cont..
Applications of nanotechnologies in medicine are especially promising, and areas such as disease diagnosis, drug delivery targeted at specific sites in the body, and molecular imaging are being intensively investigated and some products undergoing clinical trials.
Shaffer C. Nanomedicine transforms drug delivery. Drug Discovery Today 2005;10:
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

17. Nanotechnology in gene delivery
Applications of nanotechnological tools in human gene therapy has been reviewed widely by Prof. Davis, who described non-viral vectors based on nanoparticles (usually nm in size) that were already tested to transport plasmid DNA.
He emphasized that nanotechnology in gene therapy would be applied to replace the currently used viral vectors by potentially less immunogenic nanosize gene carriers. So delivery of repaired genes or the replacement of incorrect genes are fields in which nanoscale objects could be introduced successfully.
Davis SS. Biomedical applications of nanotechnology—implications for drug targeting and gene therapy. Trends Biotechnol 1997;15:
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

18. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Liposomes.
Nanoparticles.
Dendrimers.
All could be used for
gene delivery…
28 April 2008
Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

19. Nanotechnology in cardiac therapy
For instance, abciximab, a chimeric mouse-human monoclonal antibody used to lessen the chance of heart attack in people who need percutaneous coronary intervention, can be considered as an example of a simple nanomachine. It has sensors that bind to the GP2b3a receptor and also has an beffectorQ that inhibits the receptor through steric hindrance. Thus, by inhibiting the ability of the GP2b3a receptor to bind fibrinogen, abciximab changes platelet behavior, impeding platelet aggregation and activation.
Tenecteplase (TNK-rt-PA), another nanomachine used in cardiac therapy, is a tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) produced by recombinant DNA technology using an established mammalian cell line (Chinese hamster ovary cells). It differs from rt-PA by three sets of substitution mutations that decrease its plasma clearance rate and is used to dissolve blood clots that have formed in the blood vessels of the heart that seriously lessen the flow of blood in the heart.
Kong DF, Goldschmidt-Clermont PJ. Tiny solutions for giant cardiac problems. Trends Cardiovasc Med 2005;15:
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

20. Nanotechnology in dental care
In the years to come it will be possible through nanodentistry to induce local anesthesia.
Nanodentistry will make it possible to maintain near-perfect oral health through the use of nanomaterials, biotechnology.
Slavkin HC. Entering the era of molecular dentistry. J Am Dent Assoc 1999;130:
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

21. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Over the next couple of years it is widely anticipated that nanotechnology will continue to evolve and expand in many areas of life and science, and the achievements of nanotechnology will be applied in medical sciences, including diagnostics, drug delivery systems, and patient treatment.
Editorial, Lancet (2003) 362, 673
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

22. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
As pharmacists
We need to answer the following:
Where are we from all of this?
Saudi Pharmaceutical companies are far a way from this.
Saudi Pharmacy Academic library is still in beginning stage.
28 April 2008
Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

23. Saudi – International Collaboration in nanotechnology
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

24. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
KACST and IBM (Jan. 2008)
King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST), the country's national research and development organisation, has signed an agreement with IBM Research to establish a Nanotechnology Centre of Excellence. "Strategically this is very important technology for us," His Highness Dr Turki bin Saud, KACST vice president for research institutes told Arabian Business. "We missed the train in the past but we think this is our chance to ride the train and be part of this developed world, and we think the partnership with IBM will take us there."
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

25. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
King Abdullah University of Science and Technology and Hong Kong University (February 27 – 2008)
KAUST and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) establishing a long-term collaboration between the two research institutions.
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (United States); Institut Français du Pétrole (France); National University of Singapore, the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (India); American University in Cairo (Egypt); and Technische Universität München (Germany).
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Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

26. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Saudi Aramco
Microscopic nanorobots may sound as futuristic as flying saucers and teleportation, but research already is under way at Saudi Aramco to put nanotechnology to work in oil reservoirs throughout the Kingdom.
28 April 2008
Changing The Practice of Pharmacy

27. Changing The Practice of Pharmacy
Thank you all
28 April 2008
Changing The Practice of Pharmacy