Abstract
Regarding the antiparasitic effects of Betulinic acid (B) against Leishmaniasis, it was loaded into nanochitosan (K) for the first time in order to improve its therapeutic effects and decrease its side effects for the treatment of Leishmania major-infected Balb/c mice. Improvement the therapeutic efficacy of Bas an anti-leishmania agent through increasing the effective dose was achieved by using a novel solvent and phase separation method for K synthesis. The synthesized K with the size of 102 nm and Betulinic acid-nanochitosan (BK) with the size of 124 nm and drug loading efficiency of 93%, cellular uptake of 97.5% with the slow drug release pattern was prepared. To increase the therapeutic dose, a modified 10% acetic acid solvent was used. The in vitro and in vivo results showed that the nanodrug of BK was non toxic by 100% and BK20 mg/kg could completely performed the wound healing and inhibit the parasite in a large extent (P ˂ 0.001) compared to other groups. Therefore, BK could be considered as an alternative regimen for treatment of L. major.