Synergistic Combinations of Penetration Enhancers and Their Discovery by High-Throughput Screening

Synergistic Combinations of Penetration Enhancers and Their Discovery by High-Throughput Screening 

Pankaj Karande, Amit Jain, and Samir Mitragotri 

Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California, Santa Barbara, California, U.S.A. 

Use of CPEs provides greater design flexibility in tailoring the delivery vehicle and results in a simple Band-Aid -like delivery device. This method almost completely eliminates the use of any external physical gadgetry and is therefore cost effective and 

The lack of significant impact of CPEs on transdermal delivery vehicles is related to the inherent nonspecific activity of CPEs in the different strata of the skin, as discussed earlier. This limitation may be overcome by utilization of mixtures of CPEs. Research has already shown that binary mixtures of CPEs provide increased permeation enhancement as well as increased safety compared to single enhancers. Such unique chemical combinations, called synergistic combinations of penetration enhancers or SCOPE formulations, offer new opportunities in transdermal drug delivery (46). 

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