Cyclodextrin-based dermatological formulations: dermopharmaceutical and cosmetic applications

The progress in new delivery systems for active ingredients has boosted the dermopharmaceutical and cosmetic fields by allowing formulations to display enhanced skin permeation capabilities. Cyclodextrins (CDs) are cyclic oligosaccharides able to form host-guest inclusion complexes with guest active molecules, resulting in improved physicochemical properties of such molecules. The incorporation of CDs in dermopharmaceutical and cosmetics formulations has received much attention since the late 1970 s by enhancing modulation of the passage through the skin and vectorization into the target site while simultaneously offering a biocompatible delivery system. This paper features the advantages of CDs in dermopharmaceutical and cosmetic applications, such as the improvement of the apparent solubility and the stability of the active ingredients, the possibility of masking unpleasant odors, among others that are be described, emphasizing that these versatile skin active ingredient carriers are strongly promising both in the treatment of skin diseases and in the improvement of cosmetic formulations.