Ultrasound-mediated delivery systems have mainly focused on microbubble contrast agents as carriers of drugs or genetic material. This study utilizes micron-sized, perfluoropentane (PFP) emulsions as carriers for chlorambucil (CHL), a lipophilic chemotherapeutic. The release of CHL is achieved via acoustic droplet vaporization (ADV), whereby the superheated emulsion is converted into gas bubbles using ultrasound. Emulsions were made using an albumin shell and soybean oil as the CHL carrier. The ratio of the PFP to soybean oil phases in the droplets, as well as the fraction of droplets that vaporize per ultrasound exposure were shown to correlate with droplet diameter. A 60-minute incubation with the CHL-loaded emulsion caused a 46.7% cellular growth inhibition, whereas incubation with the CHL-loaded emulsion that was exposed to ultrasound at 6.3 MHz caused an 84.3% growth inhibition. This difference was statistically significant (p < 0.01), signifying that ADV can be used as a method to substantially enhance drug delivery.

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