Hydroxyzine, promethazine and thioridazine interaction with phospholipid monomolecular layers at the air–water interface Original Research Article

In this work the interaction of Hydroxyzine, Promethazine and Thioridazine with Langmuir films of dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine (dpPC) and dipalmitoylphosphatidic acid (dpPA), is studied. Temporal variations in lateral surface pressure (π) were measured at different initial π (πi), subphase pH and drug-concentration. Drugs with the smallest (PRO) and largest (HYD) molecular size exhibited the lowest adsorption (ka) and the highest desorption (kd) rate constant values, respectively. The affinity binding constants (Kb) obtained in monolayers followed the same profile (Kb,PRO < Kb,HYD < Kb,THI) of the egg-PC/water partition coefficients (P) determined in bilayers. The drug concentration required to reach the half-maximal Δπ at πi = 14 mN/m (K0.5), was very sensitive to pH. The maximal increment in π upon drug incorporation into the monolayer (Δπmax) will depend on the phospholipid collapse pressure (πc), the monolayersʹs compressibility and drugʹs size, shape and charge. The higher πc of dpPC lead to higher πcut-off values (maximal π allowing drug penetration), if compared with dpPA. In dpPC and dpPA πcut-off decreased as a function of the molecular size of the uncharged drugs. In dpPA, protonated drugs became electrostatically trapped at the monolayer surface hence drug penetration, monolayer deformation and π increase were impaired and the correlation between πcut-off and drug molecular size was lost.