Preparation And Characterization Of A Drug Delivery System Based On Nanostructured Lipid Carriers Gel For Minoxidil

Nanostructured lipid carrier(NLC)is an interesting delivery system for enhancing the penetration of an active substance through the skin after topical administration.The present paper described the development of a novel NLC for minoxidil(MXD)topical delivery.The aim of our study was to develop minoxidil loaded nanostructured lipid carrier which exhibited high drug loading,uniform particle size and good stability.Then MXD-NLC gel was prepared for topical administration and the pharmacodynamic experiment was carried out to evaluate the treatment efficacy of alopecia.Stearic acid and Oleic acid that showed the highest solubility for MXD were selected as solid lipid and liquid lipid respectively,and the NLC were prepared by hot high pressure homogenization method.According to single factor investigation,2% MXD was successfully introduced into NLC dispersions,composed of 1.5% Tween-80 and 0.5% Span-80 as surfactants,4% Stearic acid as a solid lipid and 8% Oleic acid as a liquid lipid.The minoxidil loaded NLC prepared accordingly to the optimal formulation were exhibited spherical shape with a mean diameter of 281.4 nm,polydispersity of 0.207,Zeta potential of-32.90 mV and drug entrapment efficiency of 92.5 %.Storage stability studies demonstrated that the particle size and entrapment efficiency of the MXD-NLC were not significantly changed during three months at 4 ?.The percentage of cumulative drug release was 42.9 % after 24 h and the percentage of cumulative drug permeated through rat skin was 27.4 %.The developed formulation resulted in no erythema on the rat skin.It was inconveninet for the storage and clinical use of MXD-NLC.Thus,minoxidil loaded nanostructured lipid carrier gel was prepared.In vitro drug release and in vitro skin permeation were conducted using vertical Franz diffusion cells.The percentage of cumulative drug release was 35.6 % after 24 h and the percentage of cumulative drug permeated through rat skin was 21.3 % with the amount of drug deposited in the skin was 291.4 ?g.The long term test and accelerated test were carried out to investigate the stability of MXD-NLC gel.The MXD-NLC gel was not changed during the storage time in these two tests.With androgenetic alopecia mice model as the research object,the alopecia treatment efficacy experiment of MXD-NLC gel was carried out.The results showed that the developed formulation demonstrated effective treatment of androgenetic alopecia mice.All these results indicated that the developed NLC could be a promising and effective nanocarrier for topical delivery of MXD.