Issue 28, 2019

Water-based synthesis of keratin micro- and nanoparticles with tunable mucoadhesive properties for drug delivery

Abstract

Micro- and nanoparticles of proteins are very promising for drug delivery thanks to their biocompatibility, biodegradability and different interesting functionalities that the proteins can provide to the device. In the present work, we present a water-based method to synthesize micro- and nanoparticles from keratin proteins extracted from wool. This new synthesis method allows us to produce uniform particles with spherical morphology and no aggregation. The size of the particles can be controlled in the 200 to 800 nm range. The synthesis can be performed even at low temperatures, making it very interesting for the loading of keratin particles with labile drugs. The drug loading was studied in order to determine the driving factors (charge, hydrophobicity, and molecular weight) affecting the encapsulation efficiency. Both keratin in solution and the synthesized keratin particles showed a positive interaction with mucin. The mucoadhesion can be altered by loading molecules in the keratin particles, providing a mechanism that has the potential to tailor the interaction between particles and mucosae for the desired medical treatment.

Graphical abstract: Water-based synthesis of keratin micro- and nanoparticles with tunable mucoadhesive properties for drug delivery

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
04 Mar 2019
Accepted
06 Jun 2019
First published
10 Jun 2019

J. Mater. Chem. B, 2019,7, 4385-4392

Water-based synthesis of keratin micro- and nanoparticles with tunable mucoadhesive properties for drug delivery

G. Perotto, G. Sandri, C. Pignatelli, G. Milanesi and A. Athanassiou, J. Mater. Chem. B, 2019, 7, 4385 DOI: 10.1039/C9TB00443B

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements