Hydrogels for Drug Delivery
Fundamental Understanding and Practical Applications
My collaborators and I made several advances in hydrogels for drug delivery systems. These advance understanding of mass transfer and solute partitioning effects in such systems that lead to both fundamental understanding and practical applications (4 patents in this area, all of which have been licensed to industry for multiple years).
Key Advances
The key advances include:
- Demonstration that for glassy hydrogels, water diffusion into free volume dominates and hence the kinetics are not significantly dependent on gel compostion, which deviated from widely held views in the 1980s;
- Quantitative explanation for the release kinetics from compressed cellulose ether tablets based on mass transfer rather than fluid shear;
- Demonstration that size exclusion of proteins could be overcome by thermodynamic means (leading to 2 patents, and commercial development by at least three companies, including a related technology developed by a leading European scientists, Wim Hennink).
I also wrote a couple widely cited book chapters on the key principles on the use of hydrogels for drug delivery. I have consulted extensively in this area over the years as a result of my expertise in this area and its commercial importance.