Acta Pharm. 54 (2004) 287-299

Optimization of chitosan films as substitute of animal and human epidermal sheets for in vitro permeation of polar and non polar drugs

VIKAS RANA,¹ KUMAR BABITA,²  DINESH GOYAL,³  RAKESH GOREA⁴  and ASHOK TIWARY^2*

aktiwary2@rediffmail.com

¹Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Government Polytechnic for Women, Patiala-147002, India
²Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Drug Research, Punjabi University,
³Patiala-147002, India
Department of Biotechnology and Environmental Sciences, Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology, Patiala-147002, India
⁴Department of Forensic Sciences, Government Medical College, Patiala-147002, India

The present investigation is aimed at preparing chitosan films capable of simulating the flux of modal drugs, 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and indomethacin (INDO), across rat, rabbit and human cadaver epidermal sheets. Application of statistical design revealed that the concentration of chitosan, crosslinking time and concentration of crosslinking agent significantly influenced the in vitro flux of 5-FU and INDO across chitosan films. Multiple linear regression revealed a linear influence of all these active variables on 5-FU and INDO flux. It was deduced from atomic absorption spectroscopic analyses, DSC and IR spectroscopic data that 5% (m/V) sodium tripolyphosphate (NaTPP) produced optimum crosslinking of chitosan films. The in vitro permeation of both 5-FU and INDO across optimized film formulations was found to be comparable to that obtained across rat, rabbit and human epidermal sheets. These results indicate that optimized chitosan films have a potential to be developed as a substitute for animal and human cadaver epidermal sheets for preliminary in vitro permeation studies.

Keywords: chitosan film formulations, sodium tripolyphosphate, rat epidermis, rabbit epidermis, human epidermis