A new method for the formulation of double nanoemulsions

• DOI: 10.1039/c6sm02603f
• Publication Date: 2017-01-16T13:24:02Z
• Authors: Shukai Ding; Nicolas Anton; Salman Akram; Meriem Er-Rafik; Halina Anton; Andrey Klymchenko; Wei Yu; Thierry F. Vandamme; Christophe A. Serra
• Keywords: [SPI.GPROC] Engineering Sciences [physics]/Chemical and Process Engineering; [SPI.GPROC]Engineering Sciences [physics]/Chemical and Process Engineering; 01 natural sciences; 0104 chemical sciences

Double emulsions are very attractive systems for many reasons; the most important of these are their capacity to encapsulate hydrophilic and lipophilic molecules simultaneously in a single particle and their potentiality to protect fragile hydrophilic molecules from the continuous phase. Double emulsions represent a technology that is widely present down to the micrometer scale; however, double nanoemulsions, with their new potential applications as nanomedicines or diagnosis agents, currently present a significant challenge. In this study, we propose an original two-step approach for the fabrication of double nanoemulsions with a final size below 200 nm. The process consists of the formulation of a primary water-in-oil (w1/O) nanoemulsion by high-pressure homogenization, followed by the re-emulsification of this primary emulsion by a low-energy method to preserve the double nanostructure. Various characterization techniques were undertaken to confirm the double structure and to evaluate the encapsulation efficiency of a small hydrophilic probe in the inner aqueous droplets. Complementary fluorescence confocal and cryo-TEM microscopy experiments were conducted to characterize and confirm the double structure of the double nanoemulsion.