Stable Liposomes as Drug Carriers

Deadline: 2019-10-29
Award: $150,000 CAD
Open to: Canadian SMEs*

Liposomes are used as drug delivery vehicles in indications such as cancer, pain management and vaccines. Each liposome can be uniquely produced to match the drug to be delivered and the target tissue. Among others, the physical properties of liposomes such as stability, storage, sterilization, size and charge are factors in determining their applicability and suitability for drug delivery. However, maintaining the physical properties of liposomal formulations can be difficult. For example, stability is impacted by chemical degradation, which results in phospholipid structure changes. Physical agglomeration or aggregation can change the uniformity of size distribution and encapsulation efficiency, which has an impact on the shelf-life of liposomes. Changes in the size distribution and stability problems due to the hydrolytic and oxidative degradation are general problems upon storage. NRC's certified reference material program provides reference standards and methods to confirm the physical characteristics and quality of a particle. The lack of a stable liposome formulation prevents the development of certified reference material. NRC is seeking a solution to develop stable drug carrier formulations with narrow size distributions at nanoscale and sub-micron scales, to enable the development of certified reference material to support drug product submissions, streamline the regulatory approval process and improve the manufacturability of drug delivery formulations.