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Conformable Ultrasound (cUSP) Patch for Cavitation-enhanced Transdermal Drug Delivery.

Ultrasound-induced transdermal drug delivery (sonophoresis) has long lingered in the by-lanes of academic and industrial research, and has failed to attain tangible commercial success. While localized, needleless delivery of drugs is an exciting prospect, the bulky, power-consumptive equipment and long exposure times do not justify the highly-variable, operator-dependent outcomes in the permeability enhancement effects observed in vivo. We report a conformable patch (cUSP) with embedded bulk piezoelectric elements to provide short-exposure (10 minutes) ultrasound and effect a 26.2-fold enhancement in niacinamide transport to the dermis. The final system is packaged in a compact form-factor on a flexible polymer substrate that can be applied on facial skin to aid hands-free penetration of popular cosmeceuticals. The ease-of-use and high-repeatability offered by the proposed system provides a game-changing alternative to patients and consumers suffering from skin conditions and premature skin aging.

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Contributors: Chia-Chen (Debbie) Yu, Aastha Shah, Colin Marcus, MD Osman Goni Nayeem, and Canan Dagdeviren