Impacts of dextran sulfate’s chain length on the characteristics of its self-assembled colloidal complex formed with amphiphilic small-molecule drug

A review on plant polysaccharide based on drug delivery system for construction and application, with emphasis on traditional Chinese medicine polysaccharide

Carbohydrate polymers with unique chemical composition, molecular weight and functional chemical groups show multiple potentials in drug delivery. Most carbohydrate polymers such as plant polysaccharides exhibit advantages of biodegradability, ease of modification, low immunogenicity and low toxicity. They can be conjugated, cross-linked or functionally modified, and then used as nanocarrier materials. Polysaccharide drug delivery system can avoid the phagocytosis of the reticuloendothelial system, prevent the degradation of biomolecules, and increase the bioavailability of small molecules, thus exerting effective therapeutic effects. Therefore, they have been fully explored. In this paper, we reviewed the construction methods of drug delivery systems based on carbohydrate polymers (astragalus polysaccharide, angelica polysaccharide, lycium barbarum polysaccharide, ganoderma lucidum polysaccharide, bletilla polysaccharide, glycyrrhiza polysaccharide, and epimedium polysaccharides, etc). The application of polysaccharide drug delivery systems to deliver small molecule chemotherapeutic drugs, gene drugs, and metal ion drugs was also briefly introduced. At the same time, the role of the polysaccharide drug delivery system in tumor treatment, targeted therapy, and wound healing was discussed. In addition, the research of polysaccharide delivery systems based on the therapeutic efficacy of traditional Chinese medicine was also summarized and prospected.

Enhancing the stability of amorphous drug-polyelectrolyte nanoparticle complex using a secondary small-molecule drug as the stabilizer: A case study of ibuprofen-stabilized curcumin-chitosan nanoplex

While the solubility enhancement capability of amorphous drug-polyelectrolyte nanoparticle complex (nanoplex) has been widely established, its amorphous form stability during long-term storage is often lacking for poorly-soluble drugs with high crystallization propensity, such as curcumin (CUR). Herein we presented a new stabilization strategy of amorphous CUR nanoplex using a secondary small-molecule drug - ibuprofen (IBU) - as the auxiliary stabilizer to the polyelectrolytes (i.e. chitosan). The results showed that, unlike the single-drug CUR nanoplex, the dual-drug CUR-IBU nanoplex with CUR/IBU payload ratio of 1.7 remained stable after 24-month storage. The CUR-IBU nanoplex also exhibited superior CUR solubility enhancement (4-fold higher) than the CUR nanoplex. These improvements, however, were not evident for the CUR-IBU nanoplex prepared at higher CUR/IBU payload ratio of 14 due to insufficient IBU presence. Compared to the CUR nanoplex, the CUR-IBU nanoplex exhibited smaller size with less spherical morphology (100 nm), higher zeta potential (42 versus 19 mV), lower total drug payload (73% versus 83%), and lower CUR utilization rate (53% versus 94%) due to the competition with IBU in the drug-PE complexation. These results successfully established the use of a secondary drug to not only stabilized, but also improved solubility enhancement of amorphous drug nanoplex systems.

Delivery of novel vancomycin nanoplexes for combating methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections

The development of novel antibiotic systems is needed to address the methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections. The aim of the study was to explore the novel nanoplex delivery method for vancomycin (VCM) against MRSA using dextran sulfate sodium salt (DXT) as a polyelectrolyte complexing agent. Nanoplexes were formulated by the self-assembling amphiphile polyelectrolyte complexation method and characterized. The size, polydispersity index (PDI), and zeta potential (ZP) of the optimized VCM nanoplexes were 84.6 ± 4.248 nm, 0.449 ± 0.024 and -33.0 ± 4.87 mV respectively, with 90.4 ± 0.77% complexation efficiency (CE %) and 62.3 ± 0.23% drug loading. The in vitro (3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide)tetrazolium (MTT) studies of the nanoplexes were found to be non-toxic against different mammalian cell lines tested and may confirm its biosafety. While the in vitro drug release studies demonstrated sustained slower release. The in silico study confirmed the spontaneous interaction of VCM with DXT in the presence of sodium chloride. A 6.24-fold enhancement was observed for VCM nanoplexes via in vitro antibacterial studies. Flow-cytometric analysis showed effective cell killing of 67% from VCM nanoplexes compared to 32.98% from the bare vancomycin at the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 1.25 μg/mL. The in vivo studies using BALB/c mouse skin infection model revealed that nanoplexes reduced MRSA burden by 2.3-folds compared to bare VCM. The novel nanoplexes have potential to be a promising delivery system to combat MRSA infections for improved treatment of bacterial infections.