Desenvolvimento de nanoemulsão catiônica para incorporar a peçonha do escorpião Tityus serrulatus e avaliar eficácia do soro produzido a partir de imunização de camundongos

Abstract

Scorpion stings are major cause of envenoming by animals in endemic countries, like Brazil. The scorpion antivenom is product that is able to neutralize and to protect sensitive people. However, its production has been subject of improvements taking in account the innovations on the immuno-adjuvant production and the difficult on the venom extraction, from captive animals, and the venom its toxicity. Scorpion venom has a complex composition and an adjuvant for crude venom represents a challenge that can be possibly fulfilled with drug delivery systems based on nanotechnology. In this research, we seek for innovation developing new nanoemulsion formulations to act as drug delivery system for Tityus serrulatus scorpion venom and to evaluate its immunizing properties on Balb/C mice. The nanotechnology development covered features that positively affected the adjuvant activity. We demonstrated that low energy techniques for production of the nanoemulsions allowed long term stability to the formulations with reduced and uniform droplet size (below 200 nm). The developed formulations were also robust to pH and saline variation. The formulations were also able to be covered by PEI and to maintain their stability. The formulations demonstrated capable to nonspecifically adsorb crude venom, as showed through FTIR spectroscopy technique as intermolecular interactions between nanoemulsions and crude venom. Nanoemulsions venom-load also could reduce toxicity related to venom hemolytic activity and to present low toxicity against macrophage cells (RAW 264.7). Adjuvant activity was demonstrated in comparison with aluminum hydroxide adjuvant, which scored for nanotechnology feature of act as crude venom adjuvant more efficiently to induce specific anti-IgG immunoglobulins using PEI-covered nanoemulsions.