Assay of 6-gingerol in CO₂ supercritical fluid extracts of ginger and evaluation of its sustained release from a transdermal delivery system across rat skin

Ginger has been widely used as healthy food condiment as well as traditional Chinese medicine since antiquity. Multiple potentials of ginger for treatment of various ailments have been revealed. However, the biological half-life of 6-gingerol (a principal pungent ingredient of ginger) is only 7.23 minutes while taken orally. Delivery of ginger compositions by routes other than oral have scarcely been reported. Therefore, we studied a noninvasive transdermal drug delivery system (TDDS) of ginger to bypass hepatic first pass metabolism, avoid gastrointestinal degradation and achieve long persistent release of effective compositions. After establishment of a HPLC analysis method of 6-gingerol, assays of 6-gingerol were performed to compare two kinds of ginger extracts. Then, the characteristics of transdermal delivery of 6-gingerol in TDDS were exhibited. The results showed that the contents of 6-gingerol in two kinds of ginger extracts were significantly different. The maximal delivery percentage of 6-gingerol across rat skin at 20 h was more than 40% in different TDDS formulations. TDDS may provide long-lasting delivery of ginger compounds.