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Abstract

Drug discovery and development plays a major role in the world and serves mankind. The major criteria to be considered and given importance in drug development is the solubility of a drug. Among all newly discovered chemical entities, about 40% of drugs fail to reach the market due to their poor aqueous solubility or lipophilicity. Poor solubility is not only a problem for formulation development and clinical testing but also an obstacle at the very beginning while screening new compounds for pharmacological activity. Nowadays oral route is considered as the preferred route of drug administration than other routes due to its convenience in terms of ease of administration and economy. The first requirement of drug which is supposed to be given by oral route is good aqueous solubility, as the poor solubility leads to low absorption, inadequate and variable bioavailability and also gastrointestinal mucosal toxicity. To prevent these crisis, several solubility enhancement techniques have been employed to enhance the solubility of poorly soluble drugs and hydrotropic solubilization is one of them. Besides, the advantage of certain properties like high selectivity, non-inflammability, environmentally friendly, easy availability and cost-effectiveness of hydrotropes makes this technique superior to other solubilization techniques. In the present review, an attempt has been made to discuss the hydrotropic solubilization technique and highlight the applications with this approach.