Direct nose to brain drug delivery system is a practical, safe, non-invasive and convenient form of formulation strategy and could be viewed as an excellent alternative approach to conventional dosage forms. Existence of a direct transport route from the nasal cavity to the brain, bypassing the BBB, would offer an exciting mode of delivering neurotherapeutic agents.

The polyelectrolyte complexes (PECs) are versatile formulations formed by electrostatic interactions between oppositely charged biopolymers. PECs have been investigated widely by the researchers to explore the virtues of this formulation viz. high biocompatibility, excellent biodegradability, low toxicity, cost-effective, environment-friendly, and energy-efficient production. The prime object of the present review is to present the prominent features of PECs including mechanism of PEC formation, structural models of PECs, interactions involved in PEC formation, steps involved in PEC fabrication, factors affecting the formation of PECs and applications of PECs. The patents pertaining to PECs have briefly been tabulated as well.

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Topical therapy is at the forefront in treating nail ailments (especially onychomycosis and nail psoriasis) due to its local effects, which circumvents systemic adverse events, improves patient compliance and reduces treatment cost. However, the success of topical therapy has been hindered due to poor penetration of topical therapeutics across densely keratinized nail plate barrier. For effective topical therapy across nail plate, ungual drug permeation must be enhanced. Present review is designed to provide an insight into prime aspects of transungual drug delivery viz. nail structure and physiology, various onychopathies, techniques of nail permeation enhancement and in vitro models for trans-nail drug permeation studies. Updated list of drug molecules studied across the nail plate and key commercial products have been furnished with sufficient depth. Patents pertinent to, and current clinical status of transungual drug delivery have also been comprehensively reviewed. This is the first systematic critique encompassing the detailed aspects of transungual drug delivery. In our opinion, transungual drug delivery is a promising avenue for researchers to develop novel formulations, augmenting pharmaceutical industries to commercialize the products for nail disorders.

In the era of nanoparticulate controlled and site specific drug delivery systems, use of solid lipids to produce first generation lipid nanoparticles, solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN), became a revolutionary approach in the early nineties. The present review is designed to provide an insight into how SLN are finding a niche as promising nanovectors and forms a sound basis to troubleshoot the existing problems associated with traditional systems. Herein, authors had tried to highlight the frontline aspects prominent to SLN. An updated list of lipids, advanced forms of SLN, methods of preparation, characterization parameters, and various routes of administration of SLN are explored in-depth. Stability, toxicity, stealthing, targeting efficiency and other prospectives of SLN are also discussed in detail. The present discussion embodies the potential of SLN, now being looked up by various research groups around the world for their utility in the core areas of pharmaceutical sciences, thereby urging pharmaceutical industries to foster their scale-up.