Strategy to provide a useful solution to effective delivery of dihydroartemisinin: development, characterization and in vitro studies of liposomal formulations.

Dihydroartemisinin is one of the most potent anticancer artemisinin-like compounds, able to induce cancer cell death by apoptotic pathways. Besides its effectiveness, it is a poorly water soluble drug with low bioavailability and low half-life (34-90 min), therefore, the development of new formulations of dihydroartemisinin to increase bioavailability is in great need. Conventional (P90G and cholesterol) and stealth liposomes (P90G; cholesterol and PE 18:0/18:0 PEG 2000) to deliver dihydroartemisinin to cancer cells were developed for the first time.