The development of nanocarriers encapsulating drugs for controlled release has been attracted great interest for pharmaceutical/medical applications. The aim of this project is the development of a methodology for the production of nanocarriers with 10-100 nm for biopeptide delivery, using glutathione as a model drug, applying innovative membranes (modified iso-nano-porous membranes). Glutathione-loaded nanocarriers will be produced by cross-flow membrane emulsification followed by polymer crosslinking with biodegradable chitosan polymer.
Membrane emulsification has low dispersed phase fluxes [1-3], therefore suitable membranes will be studied where the active layer has few µm and and an adequate morphology. Firstly Nuclepore track-etched 30 nm membrane with aimed features, will be studied (already characterised in the research group). Then new composite membranes will be prepared with target morphology. Commercial nanoporous membranes will become hydrophobic at the surface of the active layer. Other membranes will be developed where a metal oxide active layer is deposited by magnetrum sputtering or by sol-gel on top of a commercial hydrophilic ultrafiltration membrane (ceramic or polymeric). Finally the active layer surface becomes hydrophobic.
A model will be developed aiming at understanding the transport phenomena involved on the production of water-in-oil W/O nanoemulsions by membrane emulsification and at predicting droplet formation and detachment. This model, based on Computational Fluid Dynamics and Lattice Boltzmann methods, will be further validated experimentally. On the production of nanoparticles, the effects of the crosslinker and of the glutathione concentration on nanoparticles morphology and on glutathione encapsulation efficiency will be assessed.
The innovation of the proposed project relies on the design of the innovative membranes and on the development of a model that understands the transport phenomena involved on the production of nanoemulsions and predicts nanoemulsions characteristics. The production of nanoemulsions by membrane emulsification is a topic of interest of the PI and co-PI and is the topic of an Erasmus Mundus PhD in the research group. The research team has knowhow in membrane processes [5-7], membrane modifications by sol-gel and magnetron sputtering techniques for other applications [8, 9] and modelling of mass transfer and fluid dynamics by CFD [10-12].
The scientific objectives of this project include: 1- the understanding of the relevance of the parameters of the deposition methods under study on the membranes? morphology; 2- the development of a model for understanding and predicting the transport phenomena involved in the production of nanoemulsions and 3- Successful experimental validation of the model.