Smart polyelectrolyte microcapsules as carriers for water-soluble small molecular drug

Heat treatment is introduced as a simple method for the encapsulation of low molecular weight water-soluble drugs within layer-by-layer assembled microcapsules. A water-soluble drug, procainamide hydrochloride, could thus be encapsulated in large amount and enriched by more than 2 orders of magnitude in the assembled PDADMAC/PSS capsules. The shrunk capsules could control the unloading rate of drugs, and the drugs could be easily unloaded using ultrasonic treatment. The encapsulated amount could be quantitatively controlled via the drug concentration in the bulk. We also found that smaller capsules possess higher encapsulation capability. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.