Project name: TRANSDERMAL PATCH DEVELOPED BY LASER BASED METHODS FOR HYPERTENSIVE HEART DISEASE

Contract no. 41/05.10.2011

Project code: PN-II-RU-TE-2011-3-0267

PN II Program Name: Human Resources

Subprogram: Research projects for the stimulation of the forming of young independent research teams

Contracting authority: Executive Agency for Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation Funding

Project director: Alexandra Palla Papavlu

Coordinator: National Institute for Lasers, Plasma, and Radiation Physics

Summary:

The new trend in the era we live, e.g. tobacco use, dietary customs, and physical inactivity is responsible for the major killers worldwide - the hypertensive heart diseases. This lead to the development of new pharmaceutical forms with improved bioavailability and stable dosage by using clean technologies. Among these, transdermal patches gained popularity, being nowadays developed for everything, i.e. from contraception to Parkinson's disease. Although significant advances have been directed towards the fabrication of transdermal patches for hypertensive heart diseases, so far the already available transdermal patches present a large series of limitations. This is due to the large number of requirements they have to fulfill: the fabrication of a drug delivery system that meets all the stringent needs specific to the drug molecule, they have to be comfortable and cosmetically appealing, scale-up and manufacturability, and most important, economical. This project, through its team of six young researchers and one senior scientist, aims at using an alternative technology (i.e. MAPLE) to prepare in a quick and one-step procedure a new generation transdermal patches with Captopril as active compound, for hypertensive heart diseases, in order to overcome its side effects by oral application. Such developments of an improved state-of-the-art transdermal patch by means of MAPLE promise to be a breakthrough in the field of medicine, biotechnology, and polymer science.

Project objective
This project aims at using an alternative technology, MAPLE, to prepare in a quick and one-step procedure a new generation transdermal patches with Captopril as active compound, for hypertensive heart diseases, in order to overcome its side effects by oral application. Such developments of an improved state-of-the-art transdermal patch by means of MAPLE promise to be a breakthrough in the field of medicine, biotechnology and polymer science.

Intermediary objectives:
The main objectives are sustained by intermediate objectives, corresponding to each year:
First year: First MAPLE experiments on the polymer and polymer blends chosen. Chemical and morphological characterization of the polymer thin films deposited.
Second year: MAPLE experiments on the polymers containing active substance. Analysis of the deposited material (morphology, chemical structure, adherence, contact angle measurements, determination of weight variation and thickness, determination of drug load in the films).
Third year: The in vivo and ex vivo tests on rats

Research team
Dr. Alexandra Palla-Papavlu – project director
Dr. Maria Dinescu – senior researcher
Dr. Andreea Matei – postdoctoral researcher
Dr. Valentina Dinca - postdoctoral researcher
Dr. Mihaela Filipescu – postdoctoral researcher
Dr. Catalin Luculescu – senior researcher
Antoniu Moldovan – PhD student
 

Dissemination

First stage: 15.12.2011 (see Scientific report)

Value of first stage: 106,250 lei

Second stage: 15.12.2012 (see Scientific report)

Value of second stage: 236,250 lei

Third stage: 15.12.2013 (see Scientific report)

Value of third stage: 248,750 lei

Fourth stage: 30.09.2014 (see Scientific report)

Value of third stage: 148,350 lei