• Journal of Pharmaceutical Investigation
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.73-78
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• 2010

Hydrogels are thought to be a promising delivery carrier for protein drugs because of their favorable aqueous environment compared with nano/micro-particles of hydrophobic polymer such as PLGA. In this study, nano-sized hydrogels (nanogels) were fabricated using inverse-miniemulsion polymerization method. The mean size of nanogels in range of 90-160nm and affected by the preparation parameters such as sonication time and concentration of monomer. While longer sonication time and lower concentration of acrylamide monomer showed a tendency to produce smaller nanogels and to have lower lysozyme activity, variation of bis-methylene acrylamide concentration made no difference. Although both longer soncaton time and lower acrylamide concentration increased in vitro release rate, acrylamide concentration was more effectively affected to the control of protein release rate, which indicated that the release rate of protein from nanogels affected by not only their size but also internal structure. In conclusion, nanogels prepared by inverse-miniemulsion can be a useful carrier for application of protein drug, because of simple process, minimum contact of organic solvent and high protein activity.