full issue - Association of Biotechnology and Pharmacy
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Current Trends in <strong>Biotechnology</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Pharmacy</strong>Vol. 5 (1) 972-981 January 2011. ISSN 0973-8916 (Print), 2230-7303 (Online)Ethosomes: A Tool for Transdermal Drug Delivery972Ambekar Abdul Wahid* 1 , Nagaraju Ravouru 2 <strong>and</strong> Sawant Ramesh Lakshman 11Department <strong>of</strong> Pharmaceutics, P.D.V.V.P.F’ s College <strong>of</strong> <strong>Pharmacy</strong>, Vilad Ghat M.I.D.C,Ahmednagar – 414111 (M.S), India2Department <strong>of</strong> Pharmaceutics, Institute <strong>of</strong> Pharm. Technology, Sri Padmavati Mahila Visvavidyalayam (Women’sUniversity) Tirupati, A.P., India* For Correspondence – wahidambekar@gmail.comAbstractSince skin <strong>of</strong>fers an excellent barrier tomolecular transport, as stratum corneum is themost formidable barrier to the passage <strong>of</strong> most <strong>of</strong>the drugs, except for highly lipophilic, lowmolecular weight drugs. Various attempts havebeen made for enhanced drug delivery into thebody through the intact skin including using lipidvesicles like liposome, niosomes etc. Classicliposomes are <strong>of</strong> little or no value as carriers fortransdermal drug delivery because they do notdeeply penetrate the skin. One <strong>of</strong> the majoradvances in vesicle research is the finding thatsome specially designed vesicles possessedproperties that allowed them to success<strong>full</strong>y deliverdrugs in deeper layer <strong>of</strong> skin. Ethosome is one <strong>of</strong>the specially designed lipid carrier recentlydeveloped by Touitou et al, showing enhancedskin delivery. Ethosome are characterized byprolong physical stability with respect toliposomes.Key Words: Stratum corneum (SC), Liposome,Niosome, Classic Liposome, Ethosome.IntroductionTransdermal delivery <strong>of</strong> drugs through theskin to the systemic circulation <strong>of</strong>fers manyadvantages as compared to traditional drugdelivery systems such as increased patientacceptability, avoidance <strong>of</strong> gastrointestinaldisturbances <strong>and</strong> first pass metabolism <strong>of</strong> the drug(1, 2). Although the skin as a route for drugdelivery can <strong>of</strong>fers many advantages, the barriernature <strong>of</strong> the skin makes it difficult for most drugsto penetrate into <strong>and</strong> permeate through it (3).During the past decades there has been wideinterest in exploring new techniques to overcomethe stratum corneum barrier (4, 5). Variousphysical <strong>and</strong> chemical methods has beeninvestigated to overcome stratum corneumbarriers such as iontophoresis, sonophoresis, radi<strong>of</strong>requency, electroporation, lipid vesicles likeliposomes, niosomes, transferosomes etc (6,7,8).Drug encapsulated in lipid vesicles preparedfrom phospholipids <strong>and</strong> nonionic surfactant servesas nontoxic penetration enhancer for drugs dueto its amphiphilic nature. Lipid rich vesicles likeliposome <strong>and</strong> niosomes can be used forencapsulation hydrophilic <strong>and</strong> lipophilic as wellas low <strong>and</strong> high molecular weight drugs (9,10)However these lipid rich vesicles has a problem<strong>of</strong> poor skin permeability. Introduction <strong>of</strong>ethosomes, another novel lipid carrier developedby Touitou et al has shown enhanced skinpermeation as compared to conventionalliposomes (2, 11)EthosomesEthosomes were developed by Touitou etal as noninvasive vesicular carriers very similarEthosomes: A Tool for Transdermal Drug Delivery