MIT researchers have developed a simple, inexpensive technology to administer powerful drug formulations that are too viscous to be injected with conventional syringes and needles. Credit: Images courtesy of researchers and edited by Jose-Luis Olivares, MIT.
Researchers have designed a simple, inexpensive device for subcutaneous injection of viscous formulations.
MIT researchers have developed a simple, inexpensive technology to manage powerful drug formulations that are too viscous to be injected with conventional medical syringes.
The technology, which is described in a paper published in the magazine today Advanced health care materials, makes it possible to inject high-concentration subcutaneous drugs and other therapies. It was developed as a solution for highly effective, and extremely concentrated, biopharmaceuticals, as well as biology, which are typically intravenously diluted and injected.
“Where medicine and biology go, injectability becomes a major bottleneck, and avoids formulations that can more easily treat diseases,” says Kripa Varanasi, MIT professor of mechanical engineering. “Drug makers need to concentrate on what they do best, and formulate drugs, not get stuck by this problem of injectability.”
Leaders at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation brought the injection problem to Varanasi after reading about his previous work on dispensing liquids, which has attracted the attention of industry, ranging from aviation to toothpaste makers. A major concern of the foundation, Varanasi says, was the provision of high-concentration faxes and biological therapies to people in developing countries who could not travel from remote areas to a medical institution.
In the current pandemic, Varanasi adds, the ability to stay home and self-manage medication to treat diseases such as cancer or autoimmune disorders is also important in developed countries such as the United States.
“Self-administration of drugs or vaccines can democratize access to health care,” he says.
Researchers designed a system that would allow subcutaneous injection of high-concentration drug formulations by reducing the required injection force, which is more than what is possible with manual subcutaneous injection using a conventional syringe. Credit: Thanks to the researchers
Varanasi and Vishnu Jayaprakash, a graduate student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at MIT who are the first authors on paper, designed a system that would allow subcutaneous injection of high-concentration drug formulations by reducing the required injection force, more is then what is possible with manual subcutaneous injection with a conventional syringe.
In their system, the viscous liquid to be injected is surrounded by a lubricant, which causes the flow of the liquid through the needle. With the lubricant, only one-seventh of the injection force was required for the highest viscosity tested, so that effective subcutaneous injection of any of the more than 100 drugs could otherwise be considered viscous in this way to be administered.
“We can enable injectability of these biologies,” Jayaprakash says. “No matter how viscous your drug is, you can inject it, and this is what made this approach very attractive to us.”
Biological drugs contain protein-based formulations and are harvested from living cells. They are used to treat a wide range of diseases and disorders, and can bind specifically to specific tissue or immune cells, causing fewer unwanted reactions and eliciting certain immune responses that do not occur with other medications.
“You can adapt very specific proteins or molecules that bind to very specific receptors in the body,” says Jayaprakash. ‘They can enable a degree of personalization, specificity and immune response that is simply not available with small molecule medicines. That is the reason why people worldwide are pushing for biological medicines. ”
Due to its high viscosities, the administration of the drug has undergone subcutaneous methods which have proved to be impractical and expensive. In general, the drugs are diluted and given intravenously, which requires a visit to a hospital or doctor’s office. Jet injectors, which push the drugs through the skin without a needle, are expensive and tend to contaminate back pain. Injection of encapsulated drugs often results in their needling of the needle and additional complexity in drug production and release profiles EpiPen-style syringes are also too expensive to use widely.
To develop their technology, MIT researchers began by defining theoretical parameters and testing them before designing their device. The device consists of a two-ton syringe, one inside the other, with the inner tube supplying the viscous medicine liquid and the surrounding tube supplying a thin coating of lubricant to the drug as it enters the zero.
Because the lubricated liquid passes more easily through the needle, the viscous loadload undergoes minimal shear stress. For this reason, Jayaprakash says, the system could also be useful for 3D bioprinting of tissue made from natural components and administering cell therapies, both cases where tissue and cells can be destroyed by shear damage.
Therapeutic gels – used in bone and participatory therapies, as well as for the delivery of time-releasing medicines, among other uses – could also be more easily controlled with the syringe developed by the researchers.
“The technology works as a platform for all these other applications,” says Jayaprakash.
Pramod Bonde, Yale School of Medicine associate professor of surgery, says the technique can strongly influence the field of medicine.
“This innovative technology has the potential to have a fundamental and broad impact on how drugs are delivered in the body,” says Bonde.
Whether the technology will make a difference when researchers hunt for Covid-19 vaccine capabilities and treatments is unclear. However, the researchers say that it broadens the options when different drug formulations are considered.
“Once you have the story about the technology that is there, the sector could say consider things that were previously impossible,” Varanasi says.
With his previous work encouraging the founding of four companies, Varanasi says he and his team hope this technology will also be commercialized.
“There should be no reason why this approach, given its simplicity, can not help solve what we have heard from the industry is an emerging issue,” he says. “The fundamental work has been done. Now it just applies to different formulations. ”
Reference: “Improving the Injection of High Concentration Drugs Using Nuclear Streams” by Vishnu Jayaprakash, Maxime Costalonga, Somayajulu Dhulipala and Kripa K. Varanasi 24 August 2020, Advanced health care materials.
DOI: 10.1002 / adhm.202001022
