Laser-induced microjet injection into preablated skin for more effective transdermal drug delivery

Abstract

A breakthrough in the efficient transdermal delivery of drug via the laser-driven microjet is reported. A single source of laser beam is split into two: one beam ablates a targeted spot on a skin and another beam drives the injector for fast microjet ejection into a preablated spot. This combined ablation and microjet injection scheme using a beam splitter utilizes laser energy sharing between generation of the microhole via ablation and the microjet which is generated using the Er:YAG laser beam at a 2940-nm wavelength and pulse duration. A careful analysis of the injection mechanism is carried out by studying the response of the elastic membrane that separates a driving water unit for bubble expansion from a drug unit for a microjet ejection. The efficiency of the present delivery scheme is evaluated by the abdominal porcine skin test using the fluorescein isothiocyanate staining and the confocal microscopy for quantitative delivery confirmation. The depth of penetration and the injected volume of the drug are also confirmed by polyacrylamide gel tests.

In vivo optical monitoring of transcutaneous delivery of calcium carbonate microcontainers

“…Described microablation drug delivery technology has good perspectives for clinical applications also due to recent design of portable and efficient erbium laser devices for tissue microporation [25,26].…”

Fabrication of a Ti porous microneedle array by metal injection molding for transdermal drug delivery

“…Macromolecular drug delivery across the skin has primarily employed hypodermic needles, which have disadvantages, including accidental needle-sticks, risk of infection, bleeding, pain and needle phobia [ 7 – 10 ]. Several alternative methods have been developed to overcome the stratum corneum barrier and enhance the permeation of drug transdermal delivery, including iontophoresis [ 11 , 12 ], sonophoresis [ 13 – 16 ], magnetophoresis [ 17 – 19 ], electroporation [ 20 – 22 ], and laser [ 23 – 26 ]. These methods suffer from considerable limitations in practical and economic terms [ 1 ].…”

OCT study of skin optical clearing with preliminary laser ablation of epidermis

“…[15][16][17][18]. The appearance of skin edema in the zone of fractional microablation was detected using the backscattering spectra [19].…”