Niosomes are nonionic surfactant vesicles that have potential applications in the delivery of hydrophobic or amphiphilic drugs. Our lab developed proniosomes, a dry formulation using a sorbitol carrier coated with nonionic surfactant, which can be used to produce niosomes within minutes by the addition of hot water followed by agitation. The sorbitol carrier in the original proniosomes was soluble in the solvent used to deposit surfactant, so preparation was tedious and the dissolved sorbitol interfered with the encapsulation of one model drug. A novel method is reported here for rapid preparation of proniosomes with a wide range of surfactant loading. A slurry method has been developed to produce proniosomes using maltodextrin as the carrier. The time required to produce proniosomes by this simple method is independent of the ratio of surfactant solution to carrier material and appears to be scalable. The flexibility of the proniosome preparation method would allow for the optimization of drug encapsulation in the final formulation based on the type and amount of maltodextrin. This formulation of proniosomes is a practical and simple method of producing niosomes at the point of use for drug delivery.

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These observations provide an indication of the requirements for dry proniosomes to yield niosome suspensions of high quality.

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