Emirates Journal of Food and Agriculture 37: 1-10, doi: 10.3897/ejfa.2025.152376
Evaluation of orally disintegrating films containing ferulic acid inclusion complexes: Physical characteristics and release kinetics
expand article infoJunli Lv‡, Jiali Zou‡, Jianjiao Niu‡, Guoze Wang‡
‡ Inner Mongolia University of Science and Technology, Baotou, China

Corresponding author: Guoze Wang ( wgz13789726841@126.com )

Academic editor: Angelo Maria Giuffrè
© Junli Lv, Jiali Zou, Jianjiao Niu, Guoze Wang.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation: Lv J, Zou J, Niu J, Wang G (2025) Evaluation of orally disintegrating films containing ferulic acid inclusion complexes: Physical characteristics and release kinetics. Emirates Journal of Food and Agriculture 37: 1-10. https://doi.org/10.3897/ejfa.2025.152376
Open Access
Abstract
Orally disintegrating films (ODFs) has gained significant attention as a nutrient delivery platform due to its ease of intake. But studies on delivering ferulic acid (FA) through ODFs are still scarce. The objective of this study was to assess the physical characteristics of ODFs containing FA/β-cyclodextrin (0.5:1) (FA/β-CD (0.5:1)) and FA/hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin (0.5:1) (FA/HP-β-CD (0.5:1)) complexes, as well as analyze the release kinetics of FA in both ODFs. Confirmation of the FA/β-CD (0.5:1) and FA/HP-β-CD (0.5:1) inclusion complexes was achieved through the reduction or attenuation of FA’s distinctive peaks in FT-IR and XRD examinations. Both the ODFs containing FA/β-CD (0.5:1) and FA/HP-β-CD (0.5:1) had a thickness of 0.06 mm, a surface pH of 6.7, and a disintegration time of less than 30 s, all of which met the requirements of ODFs effectively. The release of FA in both ODF formulations exhibited a high degree of consistency with the first-order kinetic model. Furthermore, the FA/HP-β-CD (0.5:1) ODF exhibited a higher cumulative release rate compared to the FA/β-CD (0.5:1) ODF throughout the entire in-vitro digestion process, indicating that FA/HP-β-CD (0.5:1) was more suitable for ODF formulation.
Keywords
β-Cyclodextrin, Ferulic acid, Hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin, Orally disintegrating films, Physical characteristics, Release profiles