Artesunate is a butanedioic acid primarily used as an antimalarial agent. Low bioavailability and poor solubility are the major limitations of Artesunate leading to frequent dosing. The controlled-release dosage form can help in the reduction of dose frequency. Thus the present study aimed to formulate Artesunate solid lipid nanoparticles (Art-SLN) to control the drug release and ultimately lead to a reduction of dosing frequency. Art-SLNs were formulated by solvent injection method and optimized. The drug-excipients compatibility was studied by FT-IR and DSC. Entrapment efficiency, drug loading capacity, particle size analysis, surface morphology, dialysis membrane drug release, and ex-vivo drug release using chick ileum were performed. The FT-IR data revealed proper drug encapsulation within the lipid molecules. The DSC data demonstrated that the Artesunate was converted to its amorphous form suggesting its better solubility. The mean particle size of SLN was observed to be 278.1mm and the ex-vivo drug release from the optimized batch F5 was observed to be 97.5%.
Gound et al. (Sat,) studied this question.