Designing novel drug delivery systems to improve drug efficiencies have gained great interests in recent years. In this study, a new vesicular system has been prepared using thin film hydration method with slight modifications, hydrophobic drugs have been used in both lipophilic and hydrophilic phases and dry film was hydrated by hyaluronan polymeric solution, to overcome curcumin and quercetin formulation drawbacks. Briefly, different formulations were prepared according to Box-Behnken design to assess the effect of HLB value, cholesterol and hyaluronan contents on the properties of niosomes. Then, the best formulation was selected for further studies and compared with conventional niosomes. The results showed that both niosomes had spherical shapes according to Transmission Electron and Atomic Force Microscopic images. Results also showed that hyaluronan containing niosomes had smaller size and higher values of zeta potential and entrapment than conventional niosomes. The average size of hyaluronan containing niosomes was 260.37 ± 6.58 nm, the zeta potential was -34.97 ± 1.50 mv and the entrapment for curcumin and quercetin were 98.85 ± 0.55% and 93.13 ± 1.22%, respectively. The release kinetic of quercetin was best fitted to Peppas model for both conventional niosome and hyaluronan containing niosomes; while, the release kinetic of curcumin was best fitted with non-conventional order 2 and three second roots of mass for hyaluronan containing niosomes and conventional niosomes, respectively. Hyaluronan containing niosomes showed higher antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects in comparison with conventional niosomes.
Keywords: Antioxidant; Box-Behnken design; Curcumin; Hyaluronan; Niosomes; Quercetin.
Copyright © 2019. Published by Elsevier B.V.