Introduction: Cold atmospheric plasma (CAP) is gaining increasing importance as a medical or cosmetic treatment for various indications. The technology is best suited to the treatment of surfaces such as the skin and is already used in wound care and, in exemplary case studies, the reduction of superficial tumors. Several plasma sources have been reported to affect the skin barrier function and potentially enable drug delivery across or into plasma-treated skin.
Objective: In this study, this effect was quantified for different plasma sources in order to elucidate the influence of voltage rise time, pulse duration, and power density in treatments of full-thickness skin.
Methods: We compared three different dielectric barrier discharges (DBDs) as to their permeabilization efficiency using Franz diffusion cell permeation experiments and measurements of the transepithelial electrical resistance (TEER) with full-thickness human excised skin.
Results: We found a significant reduction of the TEER for all three plasma sources. Permeation of the hydrophilic sodium fluorescein molecule was enhanced by a factor of 11.7 (low power) to 41.6 (high power) through µs-pulsed DBD-treated skin. A smaller effect was observed after treatment with the ns-pulsed DBD.
Conclusions: The direct treatment of excised human full-thickness skin with CAP, specifically a DBD, can lead to pore formation and enhances transdermal transport of sodium fluorescein.
Keywords: Cold atmospheric plasma; Dielectric barrier discharge; Permeation; Plasma medicine; Plasma permeabilization; Transdermal drug delivery; Transepithelial electrical resistance.
The Author(s). Published by S. Karger AG, Basel.