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"Our results confirm that repetitive motion can
speed the passage of nanoparticles through the skin," said Nancy
Monteiro-Riviere, professor of investigative dermatology and
toxicology at NC State. "As more nanoparticles find their way into the
workplace and consumer goods, and as scientists look for innovative
ways to use nanoparticles to delivery drugs into the body, it is
critical that the nanoscience community identify these types of
external exposure factors."
In the study, a solution of buckyball-containing
amino acids were placed on small sections of pig skin. In some
experiments, the skin was held still, and in others it was flexed for
either an hour or an hour and a half. Measurements were taken eight
hours after exposure and 24 hours after exposure.
The team found that the more the skin was flexed,
the more buckyballs it took up and the deeper they penetrated.
Penetration was also found to be deeper after 24 hours than after just
eight.
Buckyballs, are spherical, soccer-ball-shaped
molecules containing 60 carbon atoms. The buckyballs used in the study
were part of an innovative molecule called Bucky amino acid, or Baa,
that was created in the lab of Rice chemist Andrew Barron. Baa is a
marriage of buckyballs and phenylalanine, one of the 20 essential
amino acids that are the building blocks of all proteins.
"The findings were a bit surprising because the
Bucky amino acids tend to form spherical clusters that are up to 12
times larger in diameter than the known width of intercellular gaps in
the skin," said Barron, the Charles W. Duncan Jr.-Welch Professor of
Chemistry, professor of materials science and associate dean for
industry interactions and technology transfer. "It's not clear why
flexing increases the uptake of fullerene peptides, but it will be
important to further investigate these mechanisms as we study the
medical potential of Bucky amino acids." |
