Scientists from New Jersey, America, have reported that modified 3-polylysine (M-EPL) can improve the water solubility of poorly-soluble bioactive compounds. The discovery suggests that M-EPL could potentially be used as a biopolymer to deliver poorly soluble drugs thereby improving their bioactivities.
At concentrations above the critical aggregation concentration, M-EPL forms a polymer micelle in aqueous solutions of size 2.4-2.6 nm, which upon further aggregation results in micelles of radius 26.8-30.8 nm as determined by synchrotron small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS). It was found that the M-EPL micelles were able to capture and solubilize compounds such as curcuminoids, which are ordinarily water-insoluble. This finding is of interest because curcuminoids (extracted from tumeric) have shown anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, antioxidant and antimicrobial activity, but their use as drug candidates is hindered by their very poor solubility.
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Structure of modified 3-polylysine micelles and their application in improving cellular antioxidant activity of curcuminoids
H. Yu, J. Li, K. Shi and Q. Huang, Food Funct., 2011, DOI: 10.1039/c1fo10053j
