Pharmaceutics, Volume 13, Issue 1

Since the 2013 Nobel Prize was awarded for the discovery of vesicle trafficking, a subgroup of nanovesicles called exosomes has been driving the research field to a new regime for understanding cellular communication. This exosome-dominated traffic c...

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Nano-drugs based on nanoparticles (NP) or on nano-assemblies as carriers of the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) are often expected to perform better compared to conventional dosage forms. Maximum realization of this potential though requires o...

Late-life mild cognitive impairment and dementia represent a significant burden on healthcare systems and a unique challenge to medicine due to the currently limited treatment options. Plant phytochemicals have been considered in alternative, or comp...

Antibody–drug conjugate (ADC) linkers play an important role in determining the safety and efficacy of ADC. The Ortho Hydroxy-Protected Aryl Sulfate (OHPAS) linker is a newly developed linker in the form of a di-aryl sulfate structure consistin...

We previously found that a complex comprising plasmid DNA (pDNA), polyethylenimine (PEI), and γ-polyglutamic acid (γ-PGA) had high transgene efficiency without cytotoxicity in vitro and in vivo. However, messenger RNA (mRNA) remains an at...

Phospholipid-coated microbubbles are ultrasound contrast agents that can be employed for ultrasound molecular imaging and drug delivery. For safe and effective implementation, microbubbles must respond uniformly and predictably to ultrasound. Therefo...

The orally disintegrating tablet (ODT) has shown vast potential as an alternative oral dosage form to conventional tablets wherein they can disintegrate rapidly (≤30 s) upon contact with saliva fluid and should have an acceptable mouthfeel as long...

Gene therapy is expected to be used for the treatment of peritoneal fibrosis, which is a serious problem associated with long-term peritoneal dialysis. Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is a well-known anti-fibrotic gene. We developed an ultrasound and...

Non-viral transfection reagents are continuously being developed in attempt to replace viral vectors. Among those non-viral vectors, dendrimers have gained increasing interest due to their unique molecular structure and multivalency. However, more im...

Oral lichen planus (OLP) is an ongoing and chronic inflammatory disease affecting the mucous membrane of the oral cavity. Currently, the treatment of choice consists in the direct application into the buccal cavity of semisolid formulations containin...

The aim of this study was to characterize a 1:1 molar ratio of a pharmacologically relevant co-amorphous atorvastatin-irbesartan (ATR-IRB) system obtained by quench cooling of the crystalline ATR/IRB physical mixture for potential use in the fixed-do...

Fraxetin is a coumarin scaffold compound extracted from Fraxinus rhynchophylla. It has antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, hepatoprotective, and antifibrotic effects. Furthermore, fraxetin has anticancer effects in breast and lung cancer. We aimed to eva...

HPLC is established as a fast convenient analytical technology for characterizing the content of empty and full capsids in purified samples containing adeno-associated virus (AAV). UV-based monitoring unfortunately over-estimates the proportion of fu...

Major developments in nanomedicines, such as nanoparticles (NPs), nanosomes, and conjugates, have revolutionized drug delivery capabilities over the past four decades. Although nanocarrier agents provide numerous advantages (e.g., greater solubility...

In this work, novel chrysin-loaded poly(ε-caprolactone) and poly(3-hydroxybutyrate) microcarriers were synthesized according to a modified oil-in-water single emulsion/solvent evaporation method, utilizing poly(vinyl alcohol) surfactant as st...

Low aqueous solubility and poor bioavailability are major concerns in the development of oral solid-dosage drug forms. In this study, we fabricated surface-attached solid dispersion (SASD) to enhance the solubility, bioavailability, and photostabilit...

Secondary metabolite production by plants is influenced by external environmental factors that can change depending on the seasons, which makes it important to know how the plant, through its metabolism, is able to adapt to these variations. Mentha x...

It is currently estimated that one in every five Americans will develop skin cancer during their lifetime. Squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) is a common type of skin cancer that can develop due to the skin’s exposure to the sun. Herein, we prepared...

Liposome-based drug delivery systems have allowed for better drug tolerability and longer circulation times but are often optimized for a single agent due to the inherent difficulty of co-encapsulating two drugs with differing chemical profiles. Here...

Treatment options for retinal diseases, such as neovascular age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, and retinal vascular disorders, have markedly expanded following the development of anti-vascular endothelial growth factor intravitre...

We developed an amorphous solid dispersion (ASD) of the poorly water-soluble molecule niclosamide that achieved a more than two-fold increase in bioavailability. Notably, this niclosamide ASD formulation increased the apparent drug solubility about 6...

Multiple drug resistance (MDR) in bacterial infections is developed with the abuse of antibiotics, posing a severe threat to global health. Tedizolid phosphate (TR-701) is an efficient prodrug of tedizolid (TR-700) against gram-positive bacteria, inc...

Cobalt porphyrin phospholipid (CoPoP) can incorporate within bilayers to enable non-covalent surface-display of antigens on liposomes by mixing with proteins bearing a polyhistidine tag (his-tag); however, the mechanisms for how this occurs are poorl...

Insulin is used for the treatment of diabetes mellitus, which is characterized by hyperglycemia. Subcutaneous injections are the standard mode of delivery for insulin therapy; however, this procedure is very often invasive, which hinders patient comp...

The alarming growth of antimicrobial resistance and recent viral pandemic events have enhanced the need for novel approaches through innovative agents that are mainly able to attach to the external layers of bacteria and viruses, causing permanent da...

Metastasis is the process of dissemination of a tumor, whereby cells from the primary site dislodge and find their way to other tissues where secondary tumors establish. Metastasis is the primary cause of death related to cancer. This process warrant...

Tauopathy is the aggregation phenomenon of tau proteins and associated with neurodegenerative diseases. It metastasizes via the transfer of tau aggregates to adjacent neuron cells; however, the mechanism has not yet been fully understood. Moreover, i...

Nanocarriers such as liposomes have been attracting attention as novel therapeutic methods for inflammatory autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and ulcerative colitis. The physicochemical properties of intravenously administered nanomedi...

Patient-centric care entails optimising healthcare provision to patients based on their perspective and opinion. It involves appropriate treatment at a reasonable cost and a focus on patient characteristics in the decision-making process to make it m...

Solid lipid particles (SLPs) can sustainably encapsulate and release therapeutic agents over long periods, modifying their biodistribution, toxicity, and side effects. To date, no studies have been reported using SLPs loaded with doxorubicin chemothe...

Giardiasis is a parasitism produced by the protozoa Giardia intestinalis that lives as trophozoite in the small intestine (mainly in the duodenum) attached to the intestinal villus by means of billed discs. The first line treatment is metronidazole,...

The blood–brain barrier (BBB) is equipped with unique physical and functional processes that control central nervous system (CNS) drug transport and the resulting concentration–time profiles (PK). In CNS diseases, the altered BBB and CNS...

1C1m-Fc, an anti-tumor endothelial marker 1 (TEM-1) scFv-Fc fusion protein antibody, was previously successfully radiolabeled with ¹⁷⁷Lu. TEM-1 specific tumor uptake was observed together with a non-saturation dependent liver uptake that could be rel...

The application of metallic nanoparticles (materials with size at least in one dimension ranging from 1 to 100 nm) as a new therapeutic tool will improve the diagnosis and treatment of diseases. The mitochondria could be a therapeutic target to treat...

Cyclosporin A (CsA) is a molecule with well-known immunosuppressive properties. As it also acts on the opening of mitochondrial permeability transition pore (mPTP), CsA has been evaluated for ischemic heart diseases (IHD). However, its distribution t...

Nano-engineered mesenchymal stem cells (nano-MSCs) are promising targeted drug delivery platforms for treating solid tumors. MSCs engineered with paclitaxel (PTX) loaded poly(lactide-co-glycolide) (PLGA) nanoparticles (NPs) are efficacious in treatin...

Bacteriocins are antimicrobial peptides or proteinaceous materials produced by bacteria against pathogens. These molecules have high efficiency and specificity and are equipped with many properties useful in food-related applications, such as food pr...

In this work, highly osmotic oxidized sucrose-crosslinked polyethylenimine (SP2K) polymers were developed for gene delivery systems, and the transfection mechanism is examined. First, periodate-oxidized sucrose and polyethylenimine 2K (PEI2K) were cr...

The targeted local delivery of anticancer therapeutics offers an alternative to systemic chemotherapy for oral cancers not amenable to surgical excision. However, epithelial barrier function can pose a challenge to their passive topical delivery. The...

The tendon is a highly aligned connective tissue that transmits force from muscle to bone. Each year, more than 32 million tendon injuries have been reported, in fact, tendinopathies represent at least 50% of all sports injuries, and their incidence...

Diethyldithiocarbamate Copper II (DDC-Cu) has shown potent anticancer activity against a wide range of cancer cells, but further investigations are hindered by its practical insolubility in water. In this study, inclusion complexes of DDC-Cu with hyd...

In this study, an initial in vivo evaluation of a new amikacin-deoxycholate hydrophobic salt aimed at potentiating amikacin action against hard-to-treat lung infections was undertaken by quantifying, for the first time, amikacin in whole blood. Pharm...

During the COVID-19 pandemic, several repurposed drugs have been proposed to alleviate the major health effects of the disease. These drugs are often applied with analgesics or non-steroid anti-inflammatory compounds, and co-morbid patients may also...

Approaches to develop effective drugs to kill cancer cells are mainly focused either on the improvement of the currently used chemotherapeutics or on the development of targeted therapies aimed at the selective destruction of cancer cells by steering...

We investigated the involvement of drug transporters in the pharmacokinetics of rosmarinic acid in rats as well as the transporter-mediated drug interaction potential of rosmarinic acid in HEK293 cells overexpressing clinically important solute carri...

In the present study, the objective was to attain a localized lung delivery of an anti-tubercular fluoroquinolone, moxifloxacin (MXF), targeting the alveolar macrophages through a non-invasive pulmonary route using inhalable microspheres as a dry pow...

In this study, we developed a control strategy for a drug product prepared by high-shear wet granulation and roller compaction using integrated quality by design (QbD). During the first and second stages, we optimized the process parameters through t...

The FOLFOX scheme, based on the association of 5-fluorouracil and oxaliplatin, is the most frequently indicated chemotherapy scheme for patients diagnosed with metastatic colorectal cancer. Nevertheless, development of chemoresistance is one of the m...

Extracellular vesicles are considered a novel therapeutic tool, due to their ability to transfer their cargoes to target cells. Different strategies to directly load extracellular vesicles with RNA species have been proposed. Electroporation has been...