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Updated: Dec 17, 2025

Basic Research in Plasma Medicine - A Throughput Approach from Liquids to Cells
Published on: November 17, 2017
Applications of cold atmospheric plasma for transdermal drug delivery: a review
Xiang Wen, Yue Xin, Michael R Hamblin1,2
1Wellman Center for Photomedicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02114, USA. hamblin@helix.mgh.harvard.edu.
Abstract:
Although transdermal drug delivery would be very useful for the treatment of many diseases, in practice it is difficult to accomplish for the obstruction of the stratum corneum. The application of cold atmospheric plasma (CAP) as a pretreatment to the skin surface helps to enhance the delivery of topically applied drugs into the skin and the systemic circulation. CAP can change the skin properties to improve drug penetration by various different effects based on its multiple components. This review first introduces the skin barrier properties and some traditional transdermal drug delivery strategies. Next what is known about the application of CAP in transdermal drug delivery has been summarized, including the mechanisms and possible side effects. We believe that CAP could be developed as a non-invasive and efficient pretreatment to improve the transdermal permeation of drugs in clinical practice, although more research needs to be done to overcome the challenges. Graphical Abstract.
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