Abstract
The scientific studies on drug delivery systems that transport drugs to the targeted tissues, at a certain rate and desired time intervals, have gained popularity. The main goal of the drug delivery and release systems is to maintain the drug level in the blood plasma by balancing the amount of active ingredient. In this study, pH and temperature sensitive drug carriers were prepared using chitosan as a biopolymer and clay as a natural material. The characterization of the prepared materials was performed for structural analysis by FT-IR and for morphological analysis by SEM instruments. The swelling properties of the prepared materials were investigated. In this work, Ranitidine-HCl was used as a model drug. The prepared drug carriers were first loaded with Ranitidine-HCl and release properties of the materials were investigated at two different temperatures (25oC, 37oC) and various pH medium. The data obtained from the experiments indicated that the maximum release of Ranitidine–HCl from the prepared sample was observed at pH=7,6 buffer solution at both temperatures by comparing buffer solutions. It has been shown that the materials prepared in this study are suitable carriers for the Ranitidine-HCl drug active ingredient.