“Preparation and optimization of chrysin nanoparticles for treatment of diabetes and hyperlipidemia”

Abstract

Chrysin (5,7-dihydroxyflavone) is considered an important natural flavonoid nowadays owing to its favorable biological properties. Chrysin possesses many important biological and therapeutic properties such as anti-oxidant, anti-diabetic and anxiolytic and antihyperlipidemic activities. However, the bioavailability of chrysin in humans is very low due to extensive presystemic intestinal as well as hepatic glucuronidation and sulphation. This poses many limitations to the formulation of chrysin into oral preparations and the consequent achievement of proper therapeutic efficacy for several diseases. Nanotechnology has recently become a breakthrough in the field of drug delivery research especially in the oral route such as nanoparticles (NPs), in which their particle size is measured at the nanoscale range (1–1000 nm). NPs offer unique physical and chemical properties that distinctively change with their size. In addition, nanotechnology based drug delivery systems offer benefits like reduction in dose frequency, lowering of dose size, site specific targeting, enhanced permeability, and improvement in oral bioavailability of drugs. Several types of nanoparticles have been explored for oral delivery such as polymeric nanoparticles. The polymeric nanoparticles are mainly solid particles composed of a polymer matrix (i.e., nanospheres) or shell (i.e., nanocapsules). The polymeric nanocapsules can be described as systems that have a core-shell structure where the drug is found within a cavity which is surrounded by a polymeric membrane. Advantages of nanocapsules include increased drug encapsulation due to optimized drug solubility in the core, low polymer content compared to other nanoparticulated systems such as nanospheres, and lower tissue irritation due to the polymeric shell. Furthermore, other advantages include sustained release, ease of