Agarose coating improves protein stability during sustained release

Effectiveness of drug administration has been improved developing many organic systems to target the drug to a specific site and at a desired rate. Nevertheless most of them are rapidly eliminated by the reticulum endothelial system and are poorly stable. Biocompatible and biodegradable porous silicon microparticles can be loaded with bioactive molecules and superficially modified to provide controlled release. However, the stability of the loaded bioactive molecules has not been guaranteed so far. In this work we describe an agarose coating that provides long term protection of the bioactive molecule prior to its delivery thus assuring an effective protein uptake from the cells.