Montmorillonite: An advanced material with diverse pharmaceutical and medicinal applications

Montmorillonite (MMT) clay is composed of naturally layered silicate. The clays were more popular in the pharmaceutical and other various fields due to their beneficial physicochemical properties viz. non-toxicity, high surface area, efficient adsorption capability, high swellability, high dispersibility, thixotropic behaviour, and cation exchange capacity. Chemically modified clay provides significant opportunities in variety of applications. MMT finds very crucial place in pharmaceutical field owing to its medicinal properties, which may be used to delay the drug release in chronic physiological conditions and the targeted drug release as well. It is also used to improve the dissolution rate of certain drug molecules, which increased the attention of the researchers to explore the MMT for drug delivery applications. MMT clay has been used as pharmaceutical aids viz. suspending agent, lubricant, anticaking agent, diluent, emulsifier, nanocomposites-forming material, and sometimes filler. MMT clay have been investigated in the fabrication of different pharmaceutical formulations viz. hydrogel, films, nanocomposites, and matrix-based systems. MMT has obtained industrial importance due to its adsorption property and also finds use in wastewater treatment. Other than this, MMT also finds applications in cosmetic industry, food industry, and paper industry. Considering the wide applicability of MMT, it is need of an hour to explore the MMT for further commercial exploitation.