Preparation of valaciclovir loaded bovine serum albumin nanoparticles surface-modified with glycyrrhizin and its characteristics of targeting to liver / 生物医学工程学杂志

ABSTRACT

The valaciclovir was used as the model drug, the bovine serum albumin nanoparticles (BSA-NP) were prepared by desolvation process. Glycyrrhizin (GL) was oxidized by sodium periodate to be conjugated to surface reactive amino groups (SRAG) of the VACV-BSA-NP. Gel filtration method combined with HPLC method verified that GL was covalent coupling to the surface of VACV-BSA-NP with mean 9 GL residues per albumin molecule. The mean diameter of the VACV-BSA-NP-GL was 268 +/- 23 nm, the drug loading was 1.35%, and embedding ratio was 68.76%. The characteristics of release in vitro were in accord with two-phase kinetics. The uptake amount of VACV-BSA-NP-GL by primary cultured rat hepatocytes in vitro was higher, compared to the control-VACV-BSA-NP. 69.89% and 64.82% of the VACV were concentrated in liver at 15 min after i.v. VACV-BSA-NP-GL and VACV-BSA-NP, respectively. There is a significant difference between surface-modified group and control group (P<0.10). VACV-BSA-NP-GL was successfully prepared, which is considered to be a novel drug delivery system for targeting to hepatocytes.