Are in vivo gastric bioadhesive forces accurately reflected by in vitro experiments?

Bioadhesive polymers have been used in oral drug delivery to prolong the contact of dosage forms with the site of drug absorption. Previous investigators have coated oral dosage forms in polymers that demonstrated bioadhesive properties during in vitro screens in efforts to prolong the gastric residence of drugs absorbed only in the stomach and proximal duodenum without clinical success. To further investigate the bioadhesive properties of the gastric environment, an in vivo quantitative bioadhesive fracture strength test was developed.

Evaluation of continuous flow nanosphere formation by controlled microfluidic transport.

Improved size monodispersity of populations of polymer nanospheres is of enormous interest in the fields of nanotechnology and nanomedicine. As such, the knowledge of exact experimental conditions for precise production of nanospheres is needed for nonaqueous systems. This work presents the use of controlled microfluidic transport methods to study the experimental parameters for fabricating nanoparticles utilizing phase inversion.