The carrot (Daucus carota subsp. sativus) is a root vegetable, usually orange in colour, though purple, black, red, white, and yellow cultivars exist. Carrot is a root vegetable with carotenoids, flavonoids, polyacetylenes, vitamins, and minerals, all of which possess numerous nutritional and health benefits. Besides lending truth to the old adage that carrots are good for eyes, carotenoids, polyphenols and vitamins present in carrot act as antioxidants, anticarcinogens, and immunoenhancers. Anti-diabetic, cholesterol and cardiovascular disease lowering, anti-hypertensive, hepatoprotective, renoprotective, and wound healing benefits of carrot have also been reported. The cardio-and hepatoprotective, antibacterial, anti-fungal, anti-inflammatory, and analgesic effects of carrot seed extracts are also noteworthy. All are discussed in this review article. Carrot is one of the important root vegetables rich in bioactive compounds like carotenoids and dietary fibers with appreciable levels of several other functional components having significant health-promoting properties. The consumption of carrot and its products is increasing steadily due to its recognition as an important source of natural antioxidants having anticancer activity. Apart from carrot roots being traditionally used in salad and preparation of curries in India, these could commercially be converted into nutritionally rich processed products like juice, concentrate, dried powder, canned, preserve, candy, pickle, and gazrailla. Carrot pomace containing about 50% of β-carotene could profitably be utilized for the supplementation of products like cake, bread, biscuits and preparation of several types of functional products. The present review highlights the nutritional composition, health promoting phytonutrients, functional properties, products development and by-products utilization of carrot and carrot pomace along with their potential application.

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Chitosan, a polymer obtained by deacetylation of chitin is widely studied for its pharmaceutical and nonpharmaceutical applications. Recommendations about uses of this polymer although could not be always realized due to limited solubility. Chitosan has been extensively evaluated for its mucoadhesive and absorption enhancement properties. The positive charge on the chitosan molecule gained by acidic environment in which it is soluble seems to be important for absorption enhancement. However chitosan is not soluble in medium except below pH 5.6. This limits its use as permeation enhancer in body compartments where pH is high. In this regard there is a need for chitosan derivatives with increased solubility, especially at neutral and basic pH values. This review introduces the physical background of the special properties of the various chitosan derivatives and their application. Chitosan derivatives with different physicochemical properties especially water solubility at neutral and basic values are of interest. Chemical modification of chitosan is useful for the association of bioactive molecules to polymerize and controll the drug release profile. From the studies reviewed it is concluded that chitosan derivatives are promising materials for controlled drug and nonviral gene delivery.

Abstract:The aim of this study is to prepare and evaluate sericin nanoparticles (NPs) of Verapamil Hcl which are finally formulated as buccal gel. It was envisaged to formulate the nanoparticles with gelatine, sericin and genipin. Nanoparticles incorporated gel was successfully prepared by using carbopol 934. Nanoparticles were prepared by dessolvation followed by crosslinking. Various parameters like drug content, viscosity, pH, spreadability and drug release were used to obtain the optimized formulation. The sericin nanoparticles incorporated gel shows better fast release as compare to API. The obtained results like drug content, % drug release, buccal permeation study confirmed the potential of nanoparticles as good carrier for buccal administration. The optimised sericin nanoparticles range between 100-400 nm with a zeta potential of 29.91mv showing good stability. Later, we proved our hypothesis through In vitro studies for pharmacokinetics, where we found that NPs had better bioavailability than API. NPs showed protective action and maintained normal tissue architecture. We concluded that nanoparticle form of verapamil had better bioavailability and good pharmacological actions, which might be beneficial for future formulation design perspective.

Etoricoxib belongs to a class of drugs called non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). Etoricoxib acts by reducing the pain and swelling (inflammation) in the joints and muscles of people older than 16 years of age and older patients with osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis and gout. The present study was aimed to formulate fast dissolving oral films to enhance bioavailability, avoid presystemic metabolism and fast onset of action. The Preformulation studies such as Micromeritics, melting point, partition coefficients, UV spectroscopy, thin layer chromatography, loss on drying were carried out. The fast dissolving oral film was successfully fabricated by solvent casting method. Oral film was fabricated using PVA and PVP polymer. The prepared films were evaluated for Organoleptic evaluations, film weight, thickness, folding endurance, tensile strength, drug content uniformity of films, surface pH, disintegration time and in-vitro dissolution studies and SEM study. The formulation F8 has shown disintegration time of 22±1 seconds and is more promising, showed drug release in phosphate buffer 6.8 pH 86.33% in 10 min. Hence formulation F8 was selected as best formulation. In the stability testing all films stored at elevated temperature showed slight change in pH, other parameters were found to be unchanged.