Light Scattering Studies of Amphiphilic Drugs Promethazine Hydrochloride and Imipramine Hydrochloride in Aqueous Electrolyte Solutions

Two amphiphilic drugs, promethazine hydrochloride (PMT) and imipramine hydrochloride (IMP), have been studied using both static and dynamic light scattering techniques. Due to having rigid tricyclic hydrophobic moieties in their molecules, these drugs show interesting association behavior. The static light scattering (SLS) measurements show that the self-association commenced above a well-defined critical micellar concentration (cmc), which decreases with increasing NaBr concentration. The Gibbs energy of micellization, Delta G(m)(0), in all cases, is negative. The colloidal stability of the system in terms of the interparticle interaction at different NaBr concentrations was studied using the dynamic light scattering (DLS) technique. The experimentally evaluated interparticle interaction parameter (k(D)) was compared with the Derjaguin-Landau-Verwey-Overbeek (DLVO) model. Interestingly, these two drugs with similar molecular structure show difference in their interparticle interactions, e.g., PMT showed complete agreement with the DLVO model whereas IMP showed clear deviation from this model at lower concentrations and agreement at higher concentrations of NaBr.