Factors Affecting Physical Properties of Prednisolone Loaded Nanoparticles Fabricated by Eletrohydrodynamic Atomization Technique

Abstract

Recently, nanoparticulate system has been applied to deliver drug to colon because this system can increase drug absorption, prolong drug staying in gastrointestinal tract and also minimize chance of dose dumping effect. In this study, nanoparticles (NPs) developed for colonic drug delivery were fabricated via electrohydrodynamic atomization (EHDA) to find suitable formulation and preparation conditions. The NPs were prepared by dissolving prednisolone (model drug) and Eudragit® S100 (EDS100) in methanol, ethanol, isopropanol, butanol and mixtures of ethanol with purified water in various drug/polymer weight ratio and polymer concentrations. After that, the prepared solution was injected using the EHDA machine. The preparation condition and the instrument parameters such as applied voltage, injected distance, feed rate, and drum collector rolling rate were delicately adjusted again to obtain blank and drug loaded NPs. The NPs papered from methanol offered spherical particles with diameter size of 422 nm. The products of isopropanol and butanol were shrinkage particles. The sprayed products were changed from particle to fiber when using the spraying solution prepared from high concentration of EDS100. More fiber product was obtained when high applied voltage (20kV) was utilized. Prednisolone loaded NPs were also fabricated by EHDA. SEM and zeta-potential results reveal that prednisolone was entrapped in the NPs. All the drug loaded NPs products were in spherical shape with average diameter size of 448.60-660.98 nm and the maximum drug encapsulation was 92.65%. From the preliminary result, this nanoparticulate system expresses possibility to fabricate specific colonic drug delivery.