Encapsulation of food additives and drugs by cyclodextrin functionalized electrospun nanofibers

Electrospun nanofibers attract attention of many areas including food and pharmaceutical industries thanks to their unique physical/mechanical properties like large surface area-to-volume ratio, nanoporous structure, design flexibility and lightweight. Although, in general polymers are used for fabrication of electrospun nanofibers, it is also possible to obtain electrospun nanofibers purely from cyclodextrins (CDs). CDs with truncated cone shape structure are attractive host molecules for the formation of host-guest type inclusion complexes (ICs) with variety of appropriate guest molecules. Creating ICs with CDs causes remarkable enhancement at the properties of the guest molecule, and so CDs have wide range of applications in many areas including food and pharmaceutical industries. In this thesis, polymer-free electrospun nanofibers from CD-ICs of some food additives and drugs were produced. Firstly, four food additives, menthol, carvacrol, cinnamaldehyde and beta-carotene were encapsulated by electrospun CD nanofibers. Afterwards, the solubility, heat/light stability, antibacterial/antioxidant activity of the materials were investigated to observe the effects of encapsulation by CD nanofibers on the food additives. Secondly, electrospun CD-IC nanofibers of three types of drugs, sulfisoxazole, paracetamol and catechin were produced. Since one of the most critical point for drug bioavailability is its solubility in water, the obtained electrospun drug/CD-IC nanofibers were mainly investigated in terms of change in their solubility. In the light of analyses, it can be concluded that, main drawbacks of food additives and drugs like high volatility, low solubility and low stability were reduced or removed; besides, their properties such as antioxidant and antibacterial activities were enhanced or preserved.