Abstract
Nanoemulsions have attracted great attention in research, dosage form design and pharmacotherapy. This is as a result of a number of attributes peculiar to nanoemulsions such as optical clarity, ease of preparation, thermodynamic stability and increased surface area. Nanoemulsions also known as submicron emulsions serve as vehicles for the delivery of active pharmaceutical ingredients as well as other bioactives. They are designed to address some of the problems associated with conventional drug delivery systems such as low bioavailability and noncompliance. The importance of design and development of emulsion nanocarrier systems aimed at controlling and/or improving required bioavailability levels of therapeutic agents cannot be overemphasized. Reducing droplet sizes to the nanoscale leads to some very interesting physical properties, such as optical transparency and unusual elastic behaviour. This review sheds light on the current state of nanoemulsions in the delivery of drugs and other bioactives. The morphology, formulation, characteristics and characterization of nanoemulsions were also addressed.
Highlights
Nanoemulsions are oil-in-water (o/w) emulsions with mean droplet diameters ranging from 50 to 1000 nm
The attraction of nanoemulsions for application in personal care and cosmetics as well as in health care is due to the following advantages [13,14]: 1) The very small droplet size causes a large reduction in the gravity force and the Brownian motion may be sufficient for overcoming gravity
Bivas-Benita et al [52] reported that cationic submicron emulsions are promising carriers for DNA vaccines to the lung since they are able to transfect pulmonary epithelial cells, which possibly induce cross priming of antigen-presenting cells and directly activate dendritic cells, resulting in stimulation of antigen-specific T-cells
Summary
Nanoemulsions are oil-in-water (o/w) emulsions with mean droplet diameters ranging from 50 to 1000 nm. Nanoemulsions are made from surfactants approved for human consumption and common food substances that are “Generally Recognized as Safe” (GRAS) by the FDA These emulsions are produced in large quantities by mixing a water-immiscible oil phase with an aqueous phase under high shear stress, or mechanical extrusion process that is available worldwide [1]. The lack of flocculation, sedimentation and creaming, combined with a large surface area and free energy, offer obvious advantages over emulsions of larger particle size, for this route of administration Their very large interfacial area positively influences the drug transport and their delivery, along with targeting them to specific sites [2,3]. This is primarily because extreme shear, well beyond the reach of ordinary mixing devices, must be applied to overcome the effects of surface tension to rupture the droplets into the nanoscale regime [4]
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