Tag Archives: Eva M. Herzig

Sweet medical implants courtesy of liquorice

As you have guessed, they are not making implants out of liquorice. Instead, they are using a chemical found in liquorice plants to make nanocoatings that could protect the biological components of medical implants from sterilization procedures. The Oct. 8, 2012 news item on ScienceDaily provides more detail,

Publishing their findings in the latest issue of Materials Today, a team of researchers from Germany and Austria explain how conventional sterilization techniques based on a blast of radiation, or exposure to toxic gas can damage the functional biological components of the device. The coating, containing a component found in liquorice and developed by German biotech company LEUKOCARE AG, protects these sensitive components.

Joachim Koch of the Georg-Speyer Haus, Institute for Biomedical Research in Frankfurt am Main in Germany and colleagues explain how medical devices and implants are increasingly functionalized using pharmacologically active proteins, antibodies and other biomolecules. Harsh sterilization procedures, including beta and gamma irradiation or exposure to toxic ethylene oxide can damage these sensitive molecules and render the device useless. However, without sterilization the patient is at risk of infection when the device is used or implanted.

The team has now successfully evaluated the nano-coating; a technology which employs a composition of stabilizing nano-molecules. One important ingredient is a compound known as glycyrrhizic acid, a natural, sweet-tasting chemical found in liquorice. Unlike other stabilizing approaches used in biopharmaceutical formulations, the nano-coating contains no sugars, sugar-alcohol compounds or proteins that might otherwise interfere with the biological activity of the device.

I found out a little more about the liquorice plant from this essay in Wikipedia (Note: I have removed links and footnotes),

Liquorice or licorice …  is the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra from which a somewhat sweet flavor can be extracted. The liquorice plant is a legume (related to beans and peas) that is native to southern Europe and parts of Asia. It is not botanically related to anise, star anise, or fennel, which are the sources of similar flavouring compounds. The word ‘liquorice’/’licorice’ is derived (via the Old French licoresse), from the Greek γλυκύρριζα (glukurrhiza), meaning “sweet root”,from γλυκύς (glukus), “sweet” + ῥίζα (rhiza), “root”, the name provided by Dioscorides.

Liquorice extract is produced by boiling liquorice root and subsequently evaporating most of the water, and is traded both in solid and syrup form. Its active principle is glycyrrhizin [emphasis mine], a sweetener between 30 to 50 times as sweet as sucrose, and which also has pharmaceutical effects.

Here’s a botanical illustration,

Glycyrrhiza glabra Fabaceae
Original book source: Prof. Dr. Otto Wilhelm Thomé Flora von Deutschland,
Österreich und der Schweiz 1885, Gera, Germany Permission granted to use under GFDL by Kurt Stueber (downloaded from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Illustration_Glycyrrhiza_glabra0.jpg)

This undated posting* on the Georg-Speyer-Haus Institute for Biomedical Research website  describes the testing process the team used,

The team has tested the nano-coating by coupling and stabilizing an anti-inflammatory antibody, which may be used in therapy, to a porous polyurethane surface. This carrier acts as a surrogate for a medical device. Such a system might be used as a therapeutic implant to reduce inflammation caused by an overactive immune system in severely ill patients. The researchers found that even if the test device is blasted with radiation to sterilize it entirely, neither the nano-coating nor the proteins are damaged by the radiation and the activity of the device is maintained. “This nano-coating formulation can now be applied for the production of improved biofunctionalized medical devices such as bone implants, vascular stents, and wound dressings and will ease the application of biomedical combination products,” Koch explains.

There’s no indication as to when this nanocoating will appear on the market. For those interested in the technical details, here’s the open access article, Nano-coating protects biofunctional materials by Rupert Tscheliessnig, Martin Zornig, Eva M. Herzig, Katharina Luckerath, Jens Altrichter, Kristina Kemter, Adnana Paunel-Gorgulu, Tim Logters, Joachim Windolf, Silvia Pabisch, Jindrich Cinatl, Holger F. Rabenau, Alois Jungbauer, Peter Muller-Buschbaum, Martin Scholz, and Joachim Koch can be found in Materials Today (2012) 15(9), 394-404.

LEUKOCARE AG, the company the company that developed the liquorice-based coating can be found here.