The purpose of the current investigation was to evaluate the skin delivery potential of the different nano-carrier gels including liposomal gel, ethosomal gel and microemulsion gel bearing testosterone propionate (TP) as a testosterone deficient therapy. The prepared nano-particles were characterized for their shape, particle size distribution and zeta potential. In vitro skin permeation and in vivo transdermal delivery of nano-carrier gels were studied with the Franz diffusion cells and confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM). The results showed that all of nano-particles were almost spherical with low polydispersity and nano-metric size range from 40 to 200 nm. TP ethosomal gel also provided an enhanced transdermal flux of 7.64 ± 1.4 μg/cm(2)/h and a decreased lag time of 0.69 h across rat skin as compared with the other two formulations. The skin penetration efficiency of TP nano-carrier gels also revealed that TP ethosomal gel would enhanced penetration of rhodamine red (RR)-loaded formulation to the deeper layers of the skin (268 µm) than the liposomal gel (192 µm) and microemulsion gel (228 µm). This study demonstrated TP ethosomal gel is a promising nano-carrier for delivering TP through the skin.
Keywords: Ethosomal gel; liposomal gel; microemulsion gel; testosterone propionate.