LAUSR

Abstract Bio-nanocomposite materials based on montmorillonite clay and TiO2 were arranged as controlled drug delivery system for oral administration of ciprofloxacin (CPx). For this purpose, minimum amount of the commercial CPx was selected and the extension of the release period from the prepared porous structure was provided. In order to identify the MMT amount used in drug delivery process, adsorption of CPx on MMT was performed in batch system. 0.1 g MMT was found enough to adsorb 250 mg CPx with 99.2% adsorption efficiency. CPx adsorption was best described by Temkin isotherm model (R2 = 0.96) among the other models, which indicated that the linear reduction of adsorption heat. The synthesized MMT/CPx nanocomposites, which include 0.1 g MMT, were coated with different amounts of TiO2 (10–100% wt%) to obtain MMT/CPx/TiO2 porous structure. MMT/CPx/TiO2 (10%) nanocomposite reached 100% release in 24 h in simulated gastric fluid, while MMT/CPx and commercial CPx completed the release in 15 h and 8 h in gastric fluid, respectively. The longest CPx release time in simulated blood fluid was achieved for MMT/CPx/TiO2 (30%) in 69 h. Electrostatic attractions between CPx molecule and the structure were the main reason affecting the drug delivery mechanism. Zeta potential measurements, FTIR and XRD results were also supported the experimental data. CPx release profile fitted well with Korsmeyer-Peppas kinetic model and n value was found higher than 0.89, which indicates Super Case II release mechanism.