Design of nonionic micelle-laden polysaccharide hydrogels for controlled delivery of hydrophobic drugs.

The incorporation of micelle self-assembly in hydrogels has been used to produce self-healing materials, materials with tunable mechanical properties, and hydrophilic or hydrophobic drug delivery systems. However, little is known about the connection among formulation - structure - properties (particularly transport) in these systems. This connection is explored in alkyl ethoxylate micelle-laden gellan gum hydrogels used as delivery system for the hydrophobic drug dexamethasone.

The Cloud Point of Alkyl Ethoxylates and Its Prediction with the Hydrophilic-Lipophilic Difference (HLD) Framework.

The hydrophobicity of surfactants has been described through different concepts used to guide the formulation of surfactant-water (SW) and surfactant-oil-water (SOW) systems. An integrated framework of hydrophobicity indicators could provide a complete tool for surfactant characterization, and insights on how their relationship may influence the overall phase behavior of the system. The hydrophilic-lipophilic difference (HLD) and the characteristic curvature (Cc) parameter, included in the HLD, have been shown to correlate with different hydrophobicity indicators including the hydrophilic-lipophilic balance (HLB), packing factor (Pf), phase inversion temperature (PIT), spontaneous curvature (Ho), surfactant partition (K(o-w)), and the critical micelle concentration (CMC).

Lecithin-linker formulations for self-emulsifying delivery of nutraceuticals.

Lecithin-linker microemulsions are formulations produced with soybean lecithin in combination with a highly lipophilic (lipophilic linker) and highly hydrophilic (hydrophilic linkers) surfactant-like additives. In this work, lecithin-linker systems were formulated to produce self-emulsifying delivery systems for β-carotene and β-sitosterol. The concentration of the lipophilic linker, sorbitan monooleate, was adjusted to minimize the formation of liquid crystals.