Biodegradable Amphoteric Surfactants in Titration-Ultrasound Formulation of Oil-in-Water Nanoemulsions: Rational Design, Development, and Kinetic Stability

Amphoteric amphiphilic compounds, due to their unique properties, may represent a group of safe and biocompatible surface-active agents for effective colloidal stabilization of nanoformulations. For this reason, the aim of this work was to develop and characterize the oil-in-water nanoemulsions based on two betaine-derived surfactants with high biodegradability, i.e., cocamidopropyl betaine and coco-betaine. In the first step, we investigated ternary phase diagrams of surfactant-oil-water systems containing different weight ratios of surfactant and oil, as the betaine-type surfactant entity (S), linoleic acid, or oleic acid as the oil phase (O), and the aqueous phase (W) using the titration-ultrasound approach. All the received nanoemulsion systems were then characterized upon droplets size (dynamic light scattering), surface charge (electrophoretic light scattering), and morphology (transmission electron as well as atomic force microscopy). Thermal and spinning tests revealed the most stable compositions, which were subjected to further kinetic stability analysis, including turbidimetric evaluation. Finally, the backscattering profiles revealed the most promising candidate with a size <200 nm for potential delivery of active agents in the future cosmetic, pharmaceutical, and biomedical applications.

Development of Nifedipine Amorphous Solid Dispersion Composed of Surface-Active Agents

The amorphous solid dispersions (ASDs) containing amino methacrylate copolymer and surface-active agents were prepared to improve the nifedipine (NDP) dissolution. The different types of surface-active agent i.e., polysorbates 80, sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS) and polyethylene glycol (PEG) 400 were used. In order to evaluate the ASDs formulation,powder X-ray diffractometry and thermal analysis to characterize NDP crystallinity in ASDs and the dissolution study of NDP have been performed to compare the dissolution profiles. The ASDs were kept for 6 months to investigate the stability. In the X-ray diffraction pattern, no peak was observed in all samples of ASDs. No peak was found in sample of all ASDs from the thermograms. These results suggest that the drug may be molecularly dispersed in matrix of amino methacrylate copolymer. The drug dissolution at 120 min, from ASDs without surface-active agent and NDP powder were 58.31% and 17.95%, respectively. The dissolved NDP from ASDs composed of SLS, polysorbate 80 and PEG400 were 96.25%, 88.86% and 75.32%, respectively. These results may occur due to the reduction of surface tension, the addition of the low amount of high efficiency of surface-active agent e.g., SLS (compared with PEG400 and polysorbate 80) provided the higher NDP dissolution. The content analysis of NDP in selected ASDs was studied at the end of 3 and 6 months, the NDP content remained unchanged after storage.

SURFACTANT MATERIAL PROPERTIES AND CORONAVIRUS SURFACE: A SURFACE INTERACTION FOR COVID-19 TREATMENT AND VACCINATION

Generally, the structural components of infectious diseases causing viruses like coronavirus, Ebola virus, etc., are mainly focused on developing effective treatment and vaccines. Meanwhile, the spike proteins play a major role in knowing the profound way out to curtail the respective infectivity. S1 and S2 act as the two main subunits to render prime significance to reveal the interaction of surface-active agents in this context. Keeping in view the importance of surfactants in developing effective treatment and vaccine for the coronavirus infectious disease-2019 (COVID-19), this article describes the surface chemistry of this quest. The surface action being the main mode of infectivity can thus be halted by using surface-active compounds (surfactants). Therefore, this review emphasizes the sound role of surface action linked with COVID-19 treatment and vaccination.

A Review on Biosurfactant Applications in the Petroleum Industry

The inadequacy of worldwide fossil fuel resources, combined with increasing energy demands, encourages global attention to either using alternative energy resources or improving the recovery factor and produce larger quantities from present reservoirs. Among all enhanced oil recovery (EOR) methods, surfactant injection is a well-known technique that reduces the interfacial tension (IFT) between oil and water and increases oil production. Despite numerous advantages of using surfactants, there are also a few obstacles like environmental impacts, high cost, effect on humans and other organisms due to toxicological potential, and availability from nonrenewable resources. Biosurfactants are microbial surface-active agents that decrease the surface tension (ST) of a liquid phase and the IFT of two diverse phases. They are biotechnological products of high value owing to their widespread applications, low toxicity, relatively easy preparation, and specific performance, applied in different industries like organic chemicals and fertilizers, agrochemicals, metallurgy and mining, cosmetics, foods, medical and pharmaceuticals, beverages, environmental management, and petroleum and petrochemical applications in emulsifying and demulsifying wetting agents, detergent spreading and foaming agents, and functional food ingredients. Biosurfactants are synthesized by microbes; therefore, various genetic diversities of microorganisms provide the considerable capability to produce new types of biosurfactants, which can develop EOR technology. Biosurfactants are classified into ex situ and in situ MEOR processes. The genera Pseudomonas, Bacillus, Sphingomonas, and Actinobacteria are the foremost biosurfactant-producing bacteria. This paper reviews relevant reports and results from various presented papers by researchers and companies on applications of microorganisms and biosurfactant technology with specific emphasis on EOR and MEOR processes, based on recently published articles since 2010 until now.