The objective of WG1 is the design and develop aerogel-based products as drug delivery systems for pharmaceutical technology, or as medical devices for wound healing and tissue regeneration.
WG1 is focused on the development of new therapeutic platforms based on aerogel particulate systems able to significantly improve drug bioavailability and to control the delivery of bioactive molecules
Specific Tasks of the WG1 are:
- The formulation of aerogel beads and scaffolds able to gel in presence of wound exudate enabling the treatment of chronic wounds and able to maximize the effect of encapsulated Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API)
- Processing of biodegradable aerogel-containing scaffolds for regenerative medicine with suitable morphological, mechanical and biological properties for bone repair able to maximize osteointegration
To achieve such tasks the activities of the WG1 are mainly focused on the development of aerogel-based medical devices and pharmaceutical formulations loaded with biomolecules (poorly water soluble drugs, cytotoxic drugs, proteins) and with new administration strategies. Aerogels will be designed to amorphize drugs (e.g. adsorptive precipitation) and to modulate the release profile depending on formulation composition and manufacturing technique (e.g. smart release and multiple release of different biomolecules). While properties of the aerogel-based materials will be validated by defining the carrier material and the carrier-biomolecules interactions with the dynamic physiopathological environment, also the textural properties of aerogel particles and scaffolds as well as specific properties for wound healing treatments (gelation properties, exudate absorption, transpiration) and bone repair (cell infiltration and colonization capacity, 3D-modelling, sterility, tissue integration) will be asserted. In order to validate the properties of the aerogel-based products the development of specific, efficient and robust analytical methods and protocols to predict and to assess the loading and the (in vitro and in vivo) release profiles of biomolecules from different formulations will be implemented.
