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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Wyndmoor, Pennsylvania » Eastern Regional Research Center » Dairy and Functional Foods Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #309048
Title: Electrosprayed core-shell composite microbeads based on pectin-arabinoxylans for insulin carrying: aggregation and size dispersion control

Author
item RASCON-CHU, AGUSTIN - Center For Research In Food And Development (CIAD)
item DIAZ-BACA, JONATHAN - Center For Research In Food And Development (CIAD)
item CARVAJAL-MILLAN, ELIZABETH - Center For Research In Food And Development (CIAD)
item PEREZ-LOPEZ, ELIAS - Autonomous University Of San Luis Potosi
item Hotchkiss, Arland
item GONZALEZ-RIOS, HUMBERTO - Center For Research In Food And Development (CIAD)
item BALANDRAN-QUINTANA, RENE - Center For Research In Food And Development (CIAD)
item CAMPA-MADA, ALMA - Center For Research In Food And Development (CIAD)

Submitted to: Polymers
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/19/2018
Publication Date: 1/23/2018
Publication URL: http://handle.nal.usda.gov/10113/5935355
Citation: Rascon-Chu, A., Diaz-Baca, J.A., Carvajal-Millan, E., Perez-Lopez, E., Hotchkiss, A.T., Gonzalez-Rios, H., Balandran-Quintana, R., Campa-Mada, A. 2018. Electrosprayed core-shell composite microbeads based on pectin-arabinoxylans for insulin carrying: aggregation and size dispersion control. Polymers. 10(108):1-13.

Interpretive Summary: Chronic diseases, such as diabetes, lead to high health-care costs and can cause death. Controlled-release of insulin from generally recognized as safe biodegradable biopolymers represents a more patient-friendly approach to this therapy compared to injections. However, previous methods did not produce controlled-release beads that were small enough or with uniform size. Using a specialized electrospray method, micrometer-sized beads were produced from apple pectin and a corn polysaccharide as insulin carriers. This method will allow for development of orally-administered insulin pills that won’t require a shot to control diabetes.

Technical Abstract: In Mexico, the diabetes epidemic is the second highest cause of death. Currently, nearly ten million Mexican people suffer from diabetes, of which 1 million have type I diabetes. The negative aspects of subcutaneous insulin injection have caused patients to stop using this therapy. Therefore, several studies worldwide have focused on developing new methods for oral, nasal and other administration methods. Some of these methods include the use of biopolymeric matrices as carriers. We proposed pectin and arabinoxylan as insulin carriers, due to their gelling properties and biodegradability. The rapid gel formation of pectin complimenting the pH stability and slow gelling properties of arabinoxylan was proposed as a mechanism for coaxial electrospray fabrication of core-shell beads. In order to optimize the fabrication process, we explored how flow, voltage, salt concentration and solvent content in the crosslinking solution affected bead dimensions. The response variables were magnitude and dispersion of bead particle size. For the determination of these variables, light diffraction techniques, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and confocal laser scanning microscopy were used. Stable spherical core-shell beads were obtained without aggregation, with an average diameter between 1and 2 µm. The optimized factors for beads with an average size of 1 µm, were 11 kV and 0.972 mL/h, with a reception crosslinking solution of 11 % of CaCl2 in 75 % ethanol. Statistical optimization models were obtained with up to 70% predictive power for the 1 µm particle size and limited size dispersion beads.