Electrospun Bioactive Wound Dressing containing Phospholipid stabilized Nanodispersions of a Birch Bark Dry Extract

01.09.2017 bis 31.08.2020

The human skin serves as a barrier between the body and the environment. Therefore, it is prone to microbial, thermal, mechanical and chemical threats which can cause acute or chronic wounds. Triterpenes from the outer bark of birch are known for various pharmacological effects including enhanced wound healing (WH). Polymeric nanofibers made from biodegradable and biocompatible synthetic or natural polymers have been utilized to develop drug delivery systems to treat various ailments and one of the potential area to use them is medicated wound dressing. Hence, our main aim in this work is to use birch bark dry extract which has been recently clinically proved to speed up wound healing and develop a bioactive nanofiber wound dressing. Sub-micron O/W-emulsions containing the active substance birch bark dry extract will first be produced via high-pressure homogenization [HPH] process and lecithin based phospholipids as emulsifier. Consequently, the emulsions will be blended with commercially available biodegradable and biocompatible polymers to form nanofibers intended for wound therapy using electrospinning technology. The influence of preparation processes and emulsion compositions (polymer / birch bark dry extract / phospholipid / sunflower oil) towards the drug release behavior of the scaffolds, together with their structural morphology, surface and thermal properties will be evaluated.