Structural Transitions of Self-Nanoemulsifying Drug Delivery System of Glibenclamide, Carvedilol, and Lovastatin upon Progressive Aqueous Dilution

Abstract

The dynamics of morphological transition in amphiphillic systems such as self-nanoemulsifying drug delivery system (SNEDDS) has become an increasingly active field of research in colloidal science. The present contribution deals with the morphological transition of selected optimized SNEDDS formulations of glibenclamide, carvedilol, and lovastatin on progressive aqueous dilution using transmission electron microscopy. The study emphasizes the structural aspects of the systems and stresses the effect of aqueous dilution under which the systems transform from water-in-oil (L₂) phase into bicontinuous structure and, finally, in oil-in-water (L₁) nanodroplets.

Keywords:

• Bicontinuous phase
• inverse micelles
• self-nanoemulsifying drug delivery system
• transmission electron microscopy
• worm-like micelles

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Professor D. Sasmal for helpful discussions. S. K. S. gratefully acknowledges financial support in the form of senior research fellowship provided during the period of study at Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi, India.