Computational Intelligence Modeling of the Macromolecules Release from PLGA Microspheres-Focus on Feature Selection

PLoS One. 2016 Jun 17;11(6):e0157610. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0157610. eCollection 2016.

Abstract

Poly-lactide-co-glycolide (PLGA) is a copolymer of lactic and glycolic acid. Drug release from PLGA microspheres depends not only on polymer properties but also on drug type, particle size, morphology of microspheres, release conditions, etc. Selecting a subset of relevant properties for PLGA is a challenging machine learning task as there are over three hundred features to consider. In this work, we formulate the selection of critical attributes for PLGA as a multiobjective optimization problem with the aim of minimizing the error of predicting the dissolution profile while reducing the number of attributes selected. Four bio-inspired optimization algorithms: antlion optimization, binary version of antlion optimization, grey wolf optimization, and social spider optimization are used to select the optimal feature set for predicting the dissolution profile of PLGA. Besides these, LASSO algorithm is also used for comparisons. Selection of crucial variables is performed under the assumption that both predictability and model simplicity are of equal importance to the final result. During the feature selection process, a set of input variables is employed to find minimum generalization error across different predictive models and their settings/architectures. The methodology is evaluated using predictive modeling for which various tools are chosen, such as Cubist, random forests, artificial neural networks (monotonic MLP, deep learning MLP), multivariate adaptive regression splines, classification and regression tree, and hybrid systems of fuzzy logic and evolutionary computations (fugeR). The experimental results are compared with the results reported by Szlȩk. We obtain a normalized root mean square error (NRMSE) of 15.97% versus 15.4%, and the number of selected input features is smaller, nine versus eleven.

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Drug Liberation*
  • Humans
  • Lactic Acid / chemistry*
  • Lactic Acid / therapeutic use
  • Macromolecular Substances / chemistry*
  • Macromolecular Substances / therapeutic use
  • Microspheres*
  • Particle Size
  • Polyglycolic Acid / chemistry*
  • Polyglycolic Acid / therapeutic use
  • Polylactic Acid-Polyglycolic Acid Copolymer
  • Polymers / chemistry
  • Polymers / therapeutic use

Substances

  • Macromolecular Substances
  • Polymers
  • Polylactic Acid-Polyglycolic Acid Copolymer
  • Polyglycolic Acid
  • Lactic Acid

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the IPROCOM Marie Curie initial training network, funded through the People Programme (Marie Curie Actions) of the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme FP7/2007-2013/ under REA grants agreement No. 316555, and by the Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research, CNDI-UEFISCDI, project number PN-II-PT-PCCA-2011-3.2-0917.