The Application of Nanomaterials in Kidney Stone Disease: Emerging Strategies for Early Diagnosis, Targeted Therapy, and Prevention.

Kidney stone disease is one of the most common urologic disorders worldwide and imposes a growing clinical and socioeconomic burden because of its rising prevalence, high recurrence rate, and association with chronic kidney injury and systemic metabolic abnormalities. Calcium oxalate (CaOx) stones remain the predominant stone type, and their formation is now recognized as a multistep process involving urinary supersaturation, crystal nucleation and growth, tubular epithelial injury, oxidative stress, inflammation, and crystal retention. Although current management strategies, including dietary modification, pharmacologic prevention, and endourologic interventions, have substantially improved stone clearance, important limitations remain. These include inadequate early detection, suboptimal prevention of recurrence, insufficient targeting of the local renal microenvironment, and procedure-related complications. Recent advances in nanotechnology offer new opportunities to address these unmet needs. Owing to their large specific surface area, tunable physicochemical properties, versatile surface functionalization, and capacity for multimodal integration, nanomaterials have shown considerable promise in metabolic sensing, urinary biomarker detection, targeted drug delivery, modulation of crystal growth, biomimetic renal targeting, and photothermal or photoresponsive lithotripsy. In parallel, the convergence of nanotechnology with artificial intelligence, smart diagnostic devices, and personalized metabolic profiling is reshaping kidney stone management. This shift is moving the field from passive stone removal toward active risk prediction, dynamic monitoring, and precision prevention. In this review, we summarize recent advances in nanomaterial-based strategies for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of kidney stones, with particular emphasis on CaOx disease. We also discuss the major translational barriers, including biocompatibility, long-term safety, regulatory complexity, scalable manufacturing, and cost-effectiveness, and outline future directions for clinically integrated, intelligent, and individualized stone care.