Encapsulation of clindamycin in alginate-chitosan microspheres by electrospray

Abstract

This research focused on the production of alginate/chitosan nanospheres by electrospray technique. The parameters affected size and size distribution, such as voltage, flow rate, needle gauge and working distance were investigated. The result showed that increasing voltage and needle gauge resulted in a decrease in the sphere size. Whereas when increasing the flow rate and working distance, the sphere size were increased. The optimum condition for producing the clindamycinalginate/ chitosan nanosphere were as follows: voltage of 15 kV, flow rate of 10 mL/h, needle gauge of 26g and working distance of 8 cm. The average size was 855 nm. The morphology of alginate/chitosan nanospheres were spherical shape with smooth surface. Moreover the spherical size increased but not statistically significant when the drug content in the sphere was increased. Encapsulation efficiency of 83% was successfully achieved and up to 70.35% of clindamycin was released from the nanospheres into phosphate buffer pH 7.4 at 37ºC within the period of 12 hours. Finally, a simulated skin permeation study of the clindamycin from alginate/chitosan nanospheres using cellulose membrane demonstrated that clindamycin was continuously released from the spheres for up to 12 hours of study. The clindamycinalginate/ chitosan nanospheres have antibacterial activity on Staphylococcus aureus.