X-ray Imaging for Gastrointestinal Tracking of Microscale Oral Drug Delivery Devices

Microscale devices are promising tools to overcome specific challenges within oral drug delivery. Despite the availability of advanced high-quality imaging techniques, visualization and tracking microscale in gastrointestinal (GI) tract is still a challenge. This work explores possibilities applying planar X-ray computed tomography (CT) scanning for GI rats. Microcontainers (MCs) an example that have shown great potential as delivery system. Barium sulfate (BaSO4) loaded into cavity MCs increases their overall contrast, which allows them be easily tracked. The BaSO4-loaded quantitatively tracked throughout entire rats by visualized 3D CT scanning. majority observed retain stomach 0.5–2 h, enter cecum after 3–4 leave colon 8–10 h post-administration. approaches can adopted used with other types when investigating behavior in, example, preclinical trials clinical studies.