Transdermal Polyphenol Delivery by Nano-Scaled Lipid Carriers

Quercetin is a bioflavonoid having potent antioxidant activities and skin protection. However, the low water-solubility and poor stability of quercetin limits its applications as an antioxidant. In this study, microemulsion is adapted as the vehicle for quercetin encapsulation. The ratio of surfactant/cosurfactant in the formulation affects the quercetin transdermal and accumulation efficiency. The size of microemulsions QT-ET1G1 and QT-LT1G1 was around 18 nm. QT-ET1G1 had the flux of 131.1 g/cm2 and the cumulative accumulation of 77.1 mg/g in the porcine skin after a 24-hour delivery. QT-LT1G1 had the flux of 83.4μg/cm2 and the cumulative accumulation of 33.2 mg/gin porcine skin. At the 200μg/ml quercetin concentration, the scavenging and reducing abilities of QT-ET1G1 and QT-LT1G1 were better than free quercetin. The chelating ability of QT-LT1G1 was the highest than other formulations at 25 μg/ml quercetin concentration. The antioxidant, the scavenging and reducing abilities of quercetin were still preserved after the encapsulation by using microemulsion. Our result demonstrated that microemulsion of quercetin is potent for the transdermal drug delivery and antioxidant ability.

Project ID:PB10212-0077
External Project ID:NSC102-2221-E182-075