TY - JOUR
T1 - Natural melanin
T2 - A potential pH-responsive drug release device
AU - Araújo, Marco
AU - Viveiros, Raquel
AU - Correia, Tiago R.
AU - Correia, Ilídio J.
AU - Bonifácio, Vasco D. B.
AU - Casimiro, Teresa
AU - Aguiar-Ricardo, Ana
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank financial support from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT-Lisbon) , FSE , FEDER and PIDDAC through contracts PTDC/QUI-QUI/102460/2008 (R.V. grant), PTDC/CTM/099452/2008 (M.A. grant), PTDC/EQU-EQU/116097/2009 and Pest-C/EQB/LA0006/2013 .
PY - 2014/7/20
Y1 - 2014/7/20
N2 - This work proposes melanin as a new nanocarrier for pH-responsive drug release. Melanin is an abundant natural polymer that can be easily extracted from cuttlefish as nanoparticles with a suitable size range for drug delivery. However, despite its high potentiality, the application of this biopolymer in the pharmaceutical and biomedical fields is yet to be explored. Herein, melanin nanoparticles were impregnated with metronidazole, chosen as model antibiotic drug, using supercritical carbon dioxide. The drug release profile was investigated at acidic and physiologic pH, and the dominant mechanism was found to follow a non-Fickian transport. Drug release from melanin shows a strong pH dependency, which allied to its biocompatibility and lack of cytotoxicity envisages its potential application as nanocarrier in formulations for colon and intestine targeted drug delivery.
AB - This work proposes melanin as a new nanocarrier for pH-responsive drug release. Melanin is an abundant natural polymer that can be easily extracted from cuttlefish as nanoparticles with a suitable size range for drug delivery. However, despite its high potentiality, the application of this biopolymer in the pharmaceutical and biomedical fields is yet to be explored. Herein, melanin nanoparticles were impregnated with metronidazole, chosen as model antibiotic drug, using supercritical carbon dioxide. The drug release profile was investigated at acidic and physiologic pH, and the dominant mechanism was found to follow a non-Fickian transport. Drug release from melanin shows a strong pH dependency, which allied to its biocompatibility and lack of cytotoxicity envisages its potential application as nanocarrier in formulations for colon and intestine targeted drug delivery.
KW - Biocompatibility
KW - Melanin
KW - Nanocarrier
KW - pH-responsive drug release
KW - Supercritical carbon dioxide
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84899890776&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.ijpharm.2014.04.051
DO - 10.1016/j.ijpharm.2014.04.051
M3 - Article
C2 - 24768404
AN - SCOPUS:84899890776
SN - 0378-5173
VL - 469
SP - 140
EP - 145
JO - International Journal of Pharmaceutics
JF - International Journal of Pharmaceutics
IS - 1
ER -