Developing a novel medical-grade microneedle patch to treat acne vulgaris

Imperial Bioscience aims to be the first-to-market with their microneedle drug delivery product for medical use. Microneedle-mediated delivery is defined as the non-invasive delivery of medications through the skin surface. This is an alternative to hypodermic needles, which provides enhanced patient compliance. Expanded microneedle patch technology will become a highly valuable tool for delivering various pharmaceuticals with ease but without provoking skin irritation and side effects.

Imperial Bioscience targets acne vulgaris. This project aims to understand the safety and efficacy of anti-acne drugs applied with microneedle technology in treating types of acne vulgaris that are historically considered less responsive and/or with side effects to oral medications. Work will develop a robust and stable platform for a novel means for delivering drug molecules directly into the skin where associated skin concerns originated; provide critical analysis of preclinical data for interactions of the cell types within the skin and mapping out safety and efficacy profile of microneedle technology associated with human skin inflammatory disorder of acne; leading to selection of a lead candidate for clinical study.