Study on Formulation, in vivo Exposure, and Passive Targeting of Intravenous Itraconazole Nanosuspensions

The pharmacokinetic profile of a drug can be different when delivered as a nanosuspension compared with a true solution, which may in turn affect the therapeutic effect of the drug. The goal of this study was to prepare itraconazole nanosuspensions (ITZ-Nanos) stabilized by an amphipathic polymer, polyethylene glycol-poly (benzyl aspartic acid ester) (PEG-PBLA), by the precipitation-homogenization, and study the pharmacokinetic profile of the ITZ-Nanos. The particle size and morphology of nanosuspensions were determined by Zetasizer and field emission scanning electron microscope (SEM), respectively. The dissolution profile was evaluated using a paddle method according to Chinese Pharmacopoeia 2015. The level of ITZ in plasma and tissues was measured by a HPLC method. The optimized ITZ-Nanos had an average particle size of 268.1 ± 6.5 nm and the particles were in a rectangular form. The dissolution profile of ITZ-Nanos was similar to that of commercial ITZ injections, with nearly 90% ITZ released in the first 5 min. The ITZ-Nanos displayed different pharmacokinetic properties compared with the commercial ITZ injections, including a decreased initial drug concentration, increased plasma half-life and mean residence time (MRT), and increased concentration in the liver, lung, and spleen. The ITZ-Nanos can change the in vivo distribution of ITZ and result in passive targeting to the organs with mononuclear phagocyte systems (MPS)

SideEye: Mobile assistant for blind spot monitoring

Distracted driving is an ever growing concern and driver safety systems are increasingly getting adopted. However, they still remain as features in the luxury vehicles. The high penetration of smartphones has made it possible to bring some of those safety features within everyone's reach. While some of the recent works have proposed tracking the road conditions as well as monitoring the driver with a smartphone, they have not covered the blind spot. In this paper, we present SideEye, a smartphone based system to monitor the blind spot on the driver side and alert the driver about the presence of a vehicle. We explore two approaches based on intensity variation and contour matching to detect a vehicle in the blind spot. Our evaluation shows that, when a vehicle is in the blind spot, our system can detect and alert the driver with an accuracy of 87% in real-time