Porous starch and its application in drug delivery systems

Abstract

In recent years, starch has become a new potential biomaterial for pharmaceutical applications. This biopolymer has unique physicochemical and functional characteristics, as well as various advantages such as low price, relative ease of isolation in pure form from the plant source, non-toxicity, biodegradability, good biocompatibility, and interaction with living cells. Starch is currently used in pharmacy as a binder, disintegrating agent, film-forming material, raw material for production of microspheres and nanoparticles, and a component of drug delivery systems. Porous starch, which can be obtained with physical, chemical and enzymatic methods of modification, has a large specific surface area thanks to the presence of pores and channels. It has excellent adsorption capacity and can be used to enhance the dissolution rate of poorly soluble drugs or as shell material to improve the stability and water-solubility of compounds. As a component of drug delivery systems, porous starch has another advantage: it is biodegradable, so there is no need to remove it from the body after the release of the active agent.

Deep Processing of Rice and Comprehensive Utilization of Its By-products

“…Crosslinking can increase the mechanical strength and swell resistance of porous starch, and esterification can increase the hydrophobicity of porous starch, thereby increasing its ability to adsorb non-polar and weakly polar substances. Sheng et al used alpha-amylase to prepare glutinous rice porous starch, which improved the ability of glutinous rice starch to absorb liquid [15]. Tao et al prepared rice porous starch with alpha-amylase and glucoamylase with a ratio of 1:12.…”

Anticancer and Antimicrobial Activity Evaluation of Cowpea-Porous-Starch-Formulated Silver Nanoparticles

“…ese hydroxyl groups further enable good shape, size, and dispersion tunability which in turn enhance the biodegradability and biocompatibility of the NPs [21]. In 2018, starch was officially accepted by all major regulatory agencies for use in various oral drug delivery systems [22,23]. Porous starch, in particular, has an important role in drug delivery since it processes all the properties that an ideal drug/gene delivery system should have which includes, inertness, biocompatibility, bioadhesiveness, high drug loading capacity, and amenability to synthetic modification, e.g., addition of biodegradable targeting ligands such as folic acid, for targeted delivery [22].…”

“…In 2018, starch was officially accepted by all major regulatory agencies for use in various oral drug delivery systems [22,23]. Porous starch, in particular, has an important role in drug delivery since it processes all the properties that an ideal drug/gene delivery system should have which includes, inertness, biocompatibility, bioadhesiveness, high drug loading capacity, and amenability to synthetic modification, e.g., addition of biodegradable targeting ligands such as folic acid, for targeted delivery [22]. In cowpea grains, starch is the most abundant carbohydrate, and when extracted, it is extremely small and porous which is an advantage in drug/gene delivery system design applications.…”

Construction, characterization, and bioavailability evaluation of honokiol-loaded porous starch by melting method without any solvent

“…Recently, starch has become a new biomaterial with potential pharmaceutical value. The biopolymer has distinctive physicochemical and functional properties and has the advantages of low price, nontoxicity, pure separation from plant sources, good biocompatibility, biodegradability, and interaction with living cells (Sujka et al., 2018 ). Porous starch (PS) is obtained by physical, chemical, and enzymatic modification of starch (Zhang et al., 2012 ; Majzoobi et al., 2015 ; Benavent-Gil & Rosell, 2017 ).…”