Ana Maria Carmona Ribeiro has been a full professor of Biochemistry at the University of São Paulo (USP), Brazil, since 2001. She founded the Biocolloids Laboratory at USP in 1993, and since then she has been developing novel important assemblies aimed at drug and vaccine delivery. Her background in Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and Pharmaceutics has been useful for the development of biomolecular assemblies with potential for novel biomedical applications.
Part of the book: Biomimetic Based Applications
Part of the book: Immune Response Activation
Dioctadecyldimethylammonium bromide (DODAB) is a quaternary ammonium surfactant (Quat) with interesting properties and applications. In this chapter, DODAB characteristics as compared to other Quats emphasize its self-assembly in aqueous solutions and the novel applications involving this useful cationic lipid so easily combined with biomolecules and interfaces to yield a wide range of novel uses in many fields such as delivery of drugs, vaccines and genes, design of nanoparticles, modification of interfaces, and many others yet to come.
Part of the book: Application and Characterization of Surfactants
Nanostructured materials require evaluation at a molecular level to become controllable and useful in drug and vaccine delivery. Over the years self-assembled nanomaterials such as nanoparticles and thin films have been prepared, characterized and used for biomedical applications. In this review meaningful examples of biomimetic nanomaterials and their construction based on intermolecular interactions such as the electrostatic attraction or the hydrophobic effect will be discussed. Emphasis will be placed on the interactions between polymers, lipids, surfactants and surfaces leading to bioactive supramolecular assemblies such as nanoparticles and coatings. Among the important applications of the self-assembled nanostructures and films to be reviewed are their antimicrobial effect and their adjuvant activity for vaccine delivery.
Part of the book: Surfactants and Detergents