Dry Water for Future Inhaled Medicines

Dry powder microplastics are currently used to deliver drugs to the airways due to their finely controlled particle size and compatibility with administration devices. However, biological molecules present difficulty formulating in the dry state and maintaining biological stability. Dry water (DW) is the stable dispersion of water in air. They are free-flowing dry powders that contain approximately 98% water. DW may offer an advantage in delivering biologics, such as proteins that cannot be stabilised without water, yet provide an opportunity for formulation as a dry powder product.

This project aims to explore DW formulations for delivery to the airways. DW is a method of coating water droplets with hydrophobic fumed silica particles to appear as a flowable powder, but it contains large amounts of biologics trapped inside. This makes them ideal for respiratory delivery, as the fine particle size allows for precision targeting of the target site. While developing DW, laser scattering techniques will analyse the size of the particles, and spectrometric approaches will be used to assess the stability of the encapsulated biologic molecules. The aerosolization of stable formulation will be assessed using inertial impaction techniques.