Pulsatile Drug Delivery System Triggered by Acoustic Radiation Force

Abstract

Since biological systems exhibit a circadian rhythm (24-hour cycle), they are susceptible to the timing of drug administration. Indeed, several disorders require a therapy that synchronizes with the onset of symptoms. A targeted therapy with spatially and temporally precise controlled drug release can guarantee a considerable gain in terms of efficacy and safety of the treatment compared to traditional pharmacological methods, especially for chronotherapeutic disorders. This paper presents a proof of concept of an innovative pulsatile drug delivery system remotely triggered by the acoustic radiation force of ultrasound. The device consists of a case, in which a drug-loaded gel can be embedded, and a sliding top that can be moved on demand by the application of an acoustic stimulus, thus enabling drug release. Results demonstrate for the first time that ultrasound acoustic radiation force (up to 0.1 N) can be used for an efficient pulsatile drug delivery (up to 20 µg of drug released for each shot).

Plant-derived natural products for drug discovery: current approaches and prospects

“…PDDS offers many advantages over conventional drug delivery systems including the persistent amount of drug at the site of action, reduced drug dose, preventing fluctuations, controlling side effects, and improving patient compliance. Thus, this pulsatile drug delivery with coordinated biological rhythms and therapeutic needs provides minimum harm and maximum health benefit to the patient [ 14 ].…”

Soft robot-enabled controlled release of oral drug formulations

“…In addition to ''chronotherapy'', the intelligent drug delivery system is also suitable for multiple dosing of a single implant. 57 Furthermore, the introduction of sensing capabilities into the system has the potential to achieve fully automated drug delivery, i.e., a closed-loop feedback regulation system. For example, if a device for real-time sensing of blood indicators (e.g., blood glucose) is added to an existing oral gastrointestinal drug delivery system, 54 a timely and responsive release of the payload may be achieved, with the idealized result being the maintenance of blood glucose stability.…”

“…With advances in electronics and materials engineering, on-demand and intelligent delivery techniques have been developed. These methods use external stimuli, including electrical, 40 magnetic, 54,55 optical, 56 and ultrasonic stimulation, 57,58 to control the precise release of drugs according to specific physiological properties and requirements.…”

Cell Surface Transporters and Novel Drug Developments

“…The gel encased drug would be activated by an acoustic device. This novel approach would allow drug delivery to be synchronised with the onset of symptoms as well as controlling the site, time and dosage of the required drug ( Ciancia et al, 2020 ). Another application of PDDS is tissue regeneration.…”