Hydration as a reversible approach for temporal expansion of penetration pathways to enhance transcutaneous delivery of biomacromolecules

BIOL 209

Grace Tan1, Peng Xu1, Louise Lawson2, Jibao He, jhe1@tulane.edu3, John D. Clements2, Lucia C. Freytag2, and Vijay T. John, vijay.John@tulane.edu4. (1) Department of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, (2) Deparment of Microbiology and Immunology, Tulane University School of Medicine, New Orleans, 70112, (3) Coordinated Instrumentation Facility, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, (4) Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118
The stratum corneum, which consists of layers of densely packed corneocytes, represents the main entry barrier for foreign substances into the body. In particular, biomacromolecules demonstrate little or no penetration due to their large size. This study reports the use of hydration to temporarily open up penetration pathways for biomacromolecules in the stratum corneum. Through extra hydration, separation of lipid bilayers in the intercorneocyte space and formation of spindle-shaped cisternae in porcine skin are observed. Individual corneocytes are also significantly swollen due to extra water intake. Clear disruption of lipid structures in the lamellar bilayers to form spherical lipids representative of multilamellar vesicles is observed. The penetration of a fluorescent-tagged protein molecule, fluorescein isothiocyanate-bovine serum albumin (FITC-BSA) is greatly enhanced due to the extra hydration procedure. When the porcine skin is dried in air for an hour, the skin recovers significantly and FITC-BSA no longer penetrated the skin. These results show that hydration can be exploited effectively to temporarily disrupt lipid structures, open up penetration pathways for the enhanced penetration of biomacromolecules through skin.
 

Frontiers in Chemical Biology
5:00 PM-7:00 PM, Wednesday, August 22, 2007 BCEC -- Exhibit Hall - B2, Poster

Division of Biological Chemistry

The 234th ACS National Meeting, Boston, MA, August 19-23, 2007