Abstract
Liposomes are nano-sized spherical vesicles composed of an aqueous core surrounded by one (or more) phospholipid bilayer shells. Owing to their high biocompatibility, chemical composition variability, and ease of preparation, as well as their large variety of structural properties, liposomes have been employed in a large variety of nanomedicine and biomedical applications, including nanocarriers for drug delivery, in nutraceutical fields, for immunoassays, clinical diagnostics, tissue engineering, and theranostics formulations. Particularly important is the role of liposomes in drug-delivery applications, as they improve the performance of the encapsulated drugs, reducing side effects and toxicity by enhancing its in vitro- and in vivo-controlled delivery and activity. These applications stimulated a great effort for the scale-up of the formation processes in view of suitable industrial development. Despite the improvements of conventional approaches and the development of novel routes of liposome preparation, their intrinsic sensitivity to mechanical and chemical actions is responsible for some critical issues connected with a limited colloidal stability and reduced entrapment efficiency of cargo molecules. This article analyzes the main features of the formation and fabrication techniques of liposome nanocarriers, with a special focus on the structure, parameters, and the critical factors that influence the development of a suitable and stable formulation. Recent developments and new methods for liposome preparation are also discussed, with the objective of updating the reader and providing future directions for research and development.
Highlights
Liposomes represent versatile nanoplatforms for the improved delivery of pharmaceutical drugs and active compounds in a large variety of biomedical and nanomedicine applications [1,2]
In the final stage of the detergent removal method, when the total detergent concentration becomes lower than the detergent’s critical micelles concentration (CMC), liposomes will form, while other methods should be used to remove the residual detergent remaining in water-soluble than lecithin, a subsequent dilution causes a reduction of the bile salt content within the aggregates, and this causes a decrease of the spontaneous monolayer curvature [73]
The reference setup consists of two pressurized vessels, one for an organic phase containing lipids, and the other for an aqueous phase, separated by a special porous glass membrane, having pore sizes that allow for the flow of the organic phase [68,136,137]
Summary
Liposomes represent versatile nanoplatforms for the improved delivery of pharmaceutical drugs and active compounds in a large variety of biomedical and nanomedicine applications [1,2]. The industrial applications of liposome nanoplatforms include their use as drugdelivery vehicles in nanomedicine, cancer, antimicrobial therapy, as signal carriers in biomedical diagnostics and biochemistry, as adjuvants in vaccination, and as solubilizers and support matrices for various active compounds and macromolecules [13–15]. Owing to their high biocompatibility and non-toxicity, liposomes are the most important category of clinically approved therapeutic drug nanocarriers for cancer treatment [16–18]. The modern generation of liposomes includes lipid-based targeted and theranostic nanoplatforms, obtained by the engineering of the phospholipid nanostructures [22–26] All those varieties of liposome nanoplatforms stimulated a great effort for the scale-up of the fabrication methods in view of industrial developments. We describe the main positive (and negative) aspects of each approach, as well as their potential for large-scale industrial production
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