Amphiphilic Molecules in Drug Delivery Systems
Numerous drug delivery colloidal systems are formulated using polymers or surfactants or a mixture of both, typically due to their self-assembly properties. Molecular self-assembly creates the possibility to dissolve and protect drugs from adverse externa
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Abstract Numerous drug delivery colloidal systems are formulated using polymers or surfactants or a mixture of both, typically due to their self-assembly properties. Molecular self-assembly creates the possibility to dissolve and protect drugs from adverse external environments. Therefore, it is important to understand the interactions behind the self-assembly phenomena of surfactant and polymer molecules, polymer-polymer and polymer-surfactant mixtures. A number of colloidal structures used in drug delivery formulations such as micelles, vesicles, liquid crystalline phases, microemulsions, polymer gels, aerosols, polymer-polymer and polymer-surfactant complexes will be illustrated in this chapter and their main physicochemical properties will be highlighted, keeping in mind their relevance to the drug delivery research field. Keywords Self-assembly • Amphiphilic • Nanoaggregates • Phase diagrams • Drug delivery systems • Personalized medicine
S. dos Santos • F.E. Antunes () Department of Chemistry, University of Coimbra, Rua Larga, 3004-535 Coimbra, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] B. Medronho Institute for Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Centre of Genomics and Biotechnology (IBB/CGB), Faculty of Sciences and Technology, University of Algarve, Campus de Gambelas, Ed. 8, 8005-139 Faro, Portugal T. dos Santos Centre for BioNano Interactions, School of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland J. Coelho (ed.), Drug Delivery Systems: Advanced Technologies Potentially Applicable in Personalised Treatment, Advances in Predictive, Preventive and Personalised Medicine 4, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6010-3__2, © Springer ScienceCBusiness Media Dordrecht 2013
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1 Introduction The states of matter extend well beyond atomic solids, liquids and gases. Matter organizes itself at many different length scales and in many distinct forms, each distinguished by its microscopic symmetries and dynamics. The properties of most materials result from disorder or heterogeneity at some length scale much larger than the atomic scale. More and more the details of the interactions at the atomic scale need to be understood in order to explain the properties of everyday materials. The field of soft matter is broad and extremely interesting. There are, for instance, non-crystalline states with various degrees of order (liquid crystals) and there are some states (glasses and gels) that are disordered but which behave as solids. Polymers (biopolymers), surfactants, emulsions, microemulsions and biomembranes are some examples that belong to the complex field of soft matter. The organization within such soft structures, at a certain length scale, brings the potential for encapsulating drugs, turning the structure into a drug delivery vehicle. That is to say, for instance, that the hydrophobic core of a self-assembled structure can dissolve large amounts of water-insoluble drugs. In applications such as drug therapy, soft systems are generally preferred due to their flex
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