Superhydrophobic coating to delay drug release from drug-loaded electrospun fibrous materials

Abstract The drug-loaded electrospun fibrous materials showed attractive applications in biomedical fields; however, the serve burst release of drug from this kind of drug carrier limited its further applications. In this study, inspired by water strong repellency of superhydrophobic surface, the drug-loaded electrospun fibrous mat coated with superhydrophobic layer was constructed to retard and control drug release. The results indicated that the superhydrophobic coating could be simply fabricated on the drug-loaded electrospun mat by the electrospray approach, and the thickness of the superhydrophobic coating could be finely controlled by varying the deposition time. It was further found that, as compared with drug-loaded electrospun mats, drug released sustainably from the samples coated with superhydrophobic layer, and the drug release rate could be controlled by the thickness of superhydrophobic layer. In summary, the current approach of coating a superhydrophobic layer on the drug-loaded electrospun fibrous materials offered a fundament for drug sustained release.