CLOPAM® · For drugs the skin keeps out
Too big for a gel.Too costly as a pill.Change its fate.
- Where creams and gels stop getting through
- 500 DaWhere creams and gels stop getting through
- Trips through the gut and the liver's first pass
- 0Trips through the gut and the liver's first pass
- Dose delivered in the skin, where it's needed
- LocalDose delivered in the skin, where it's needed
01 — The skin barrier
The skin keeps big molecules out.
01
The 500 Dalton rule
Practically every drug that works from a cream or gel weighs under about 500 Da. Above that, passive penetration through intact skin falls away.
02
Hydrophilic drugs stay on top
Water-loving and charged molecules cannot partition into the lipid layers of the stratum corneum, whatever their size. Penetration enhancers only go so far.
03
So they never become topicals
Peptides, proteins, oligonucleotides and many hydrophilic small molecules are left out of topical treatment altogether.
Molecular weight · log scale
- Most topical drugs: pass the skin from a gel
- Peptides: blocked by the skin
- Oligonucleotides: blocked by the skin
- Proteins: blocked by the skin
- CLOPAM: through the barrier, whatever the size
02 — The oral detour
Forced into a pill, they pay twice.
As a pill
Swallowed
100% intact
Stomach acid & enzymes
55% intact
Gut wall
20% intact
Liver, first pass
8% intact
Whole body
8% intact
On a CLOPAM patch
Patch on the skin
100% intact
Through the barrier
80% intact
Where it's needed
80% intact
Low bioavailability
Acid and enzymes break peptides and proteins down, and large or hydrophilic molecules barely cross the gut wall. Oral peptide products often absorb only a few percent of the dose, or less.
Systemic side effects
To reach the skin from the inside, the whole body has to be dosed. Drug that never needed to leave the skin reaches the gut, liver and every other organ — and brings side effects with it.
Big doses, high cost
Making up for what is lost means much larger doses of an expensive drug substance, and more variability from patient to patient.
03 — Change its fate
CLOPAM carries it through the barrier.
01
Past the stratum corneum
Microneedles cross the barrier physically, so molecular weight and polarity no longer decide what gets in.
02
Into the skin, or on into the body
The needles dissolve and release the drug in the epidermis and dermis: to act locally in skin disease, or to be absorbed systemically without the gut.
03
Packed in the tips
Patented aero-pressure manufacturing concentrates the drug in the needle tips, so more of it ends up where it should and less is wasted.
| Property | Topical gel | Oral | CLOPAM patch |
|---|---|---|---|
| Large molecules (>500 Da) | Blocked | Poorly absorbed | Delivered |
| Hydrophilic drugs | Blocked | Often poorly absorbed | Delivered |
| Peptides & proteins | Blocked | Degraded in the gut | Delivered |
| Liver first pass | — | Yes | None |
| Whole-body exposure | Low | High | Local, or systemic by design |
| Dose control | Varies with how much is rubbed in | Varies with absorption | Fixed dose per patch |
04 — Where it fits
Where it fits.
Skin disease
Deliver a large or hydrophilic drug straight into the skin, instead of dosing the whole body for a local disease.
Peptides & proteins
Molecules the skin and the gut both keep out, delivered intact through the barrier.
Oligonucleotides
Large, charged and hydrophilic: the clearest case for a physical route through the skin.
Hydrophilic small molecules
Drugs that are small enough but too water-loving to cross the lipid barrier from a gel.
A pill with side effects
Move a systemic oral drug to local delivery where the disease is, and lower whole-body exposure.
New life for a molecule
A new route of administration opens new indications, new IP and a longer life cycle for an existing drug.
Change your drug's fate.
Send us your molecule under an MTA. We'll come back with patch feasibility data — loading, release and delivery into the skin.
The dose-at-each-step picture is illustrative, not measured data. Feasibility, delivery and safety depend on the molecule and are confirmed in development.