Hydrogels are among the most common materials used in drug delivery, as polymeric\nmicelles are too. They, preferentially, load hydrophilic and hydrophobic drugs, respectively. In this\npaper, we thought to combine the favorable behaviors of both hydrogels and polymeric micelles with\nthe specific aim of delivering hydrophilic and hydrophobic drugs for dual delivery in combination\ntherapy, in particular for colon drug delivery. Thus, we developed a hydrogel by UV crosslinking\nof a methacrylated (MA) amphiphilic derivative from inulin (INU) (as known INU is specifically\ndegraded into the colon) and vitamin E (VITE), called INVITEMA. The methacrylated micelles\nwere physicochemically characterized and subjected to UV irradiation to form what we called the\nâ??nanogridsâ?. The INVITEMA nanogrids were characterized by DSC, SEM, TEM, water uptake and\nbeclomethasone dipropionate (BDP) release. In particular, the release of the hydrophobic drug\nwas specifically assessed to verify that it can spread along the hydrophilic portions and, therefore,\neffectively released. These systems can open new pharmaceutical applications for known hydrogels\nor micelle systems, considering that in literature only few examples are present.
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