SELF-ASSEMBLED ULTRADEFORMABLE PHOSPHOLIPID VESICLES WITH EDGE ACTIVATORS FOR DELIVERY OF TRANSCUTANEOUS BIOACTIVES

Molecules more than 500 Dalton normally do not permeable through skin. This prevents percutaneous delivery of the large molecular weight therapeutics as well as non-invasive transcutaneous immunization. The flexible or deformable vesicles are called as Transfersome which are derived from two words as ‘Transferred’ from Latin which means ‘To carry across’ and ‘Soma’ from Greek which means ‘Body’. The word transfersome was first introduced by Gregor Ceve in 1991. Elasticity is produced by incorporation of an edge activator in the lipid bilayer structure. The vesicular transferosomes have several orders of magnitude more elastic than the standard liposomes and therefore well suited for skin penetration. Transfersomes are composed of phosphotidyl choline which is self assembles into lipid bilayer in aqueous environment and closes to form a vesicle. The flexibility of transferosomes membrane is achieved by mixing suitable surface-active components in the proper ratios. The conclusion of this review is transfersome technology is best suited for noninvasive delivery of therapeutic molecule across open biological barriers. Transfersomes are applied in a non-occluded method to the skin and have been shown to cross through the stratum corneum lipid lamellar regions as a result of the hydration or osmotic force in the skin. They have been used as drug carriers for a range of small molecules, peptides, proteins and vaccines, both in vitro and in vivo. The methods of preparation of transferosomes are rotary film evaporation, reverse-phase evaporation, vortexing sonication, ethanol injection and freeze-thaw method etc.