Elongated microparticles tuned for targeting hyaluronic acid delivery to specific skin strata.

Objective: Microneedle or fractional laser applications are the most common topical delivery enhancement platforms. However, these methods of drug delivery are not skin strata specific. Drug delivery approaches which could target specific stratum of the skin remains a challenge.

A minimally invasive clinical model to test sunscreen toxicity based on oxidative stress levels using microbiopsy and confocal microscopy - a proof of concept study.

Objective: This proof-of-concept study demonstrated that using minimally invasive skin microsampling could enable significantly higher throughput of cosmetic testing in volunteers than conventional biopsy. Nanoparticle sunscreen was used as a model to test toxicity based on oxidative stress using microbiopsy and confocal imaging.

Methods: Six volunteers were recruited for this study (3 males and 3 females).

Absorbent Microbiopsy Sampling and RNA Extraction for Minimally Invasive, Simultaneous Blood and Skin Analysis.

Conventional skin biopsy limits the clinical research that involves cosmetically sensitive areas or pediatric applications due to its invasiveness. Here, we describe the protocol for using an absorbent microneedle-based device, absorbent microbiopsy, for minimally invasive sampling of skin and blood mixture. Our goal is to help facilitate rapid progress in clinical research, the establishment of biomarkers for skin disease and reducing the risk for clinical research participants.

Using elongated microparticles to enhance tailorable nanoemulsion delivery in excised human skin and volunteers.

This study demonstrates, for the first time, clinical testing of elongated silica microparticles (EMP) combined with tailorable nanoemulsions (TNE) to enhance topical delivery of hydrophobic drug surrogates. Likewise, this is the first report of 6-carboxyfluorescein (a model molecule for topically delivered hydrophobic drugs) AM1 & DAMP4 (novel short peptide surfactants) used in volunteers. The EMP penetrates through the epidermis and stop at the dermal-epidermal junction (DEJ).