Glycyrrhetinic acid conjugated zein capped aminated mesoporous silica nanoparticle-based dual drug delivery system for liver: A pH-dependent triggered release

Abstract

Abstract Nano-scale drug delivery systems have captivated the scientific community due to their controlled and targeted drug release. Nano carrier-based combination chemotherapy has improved pharmacokinetics of drugs compared to single drug administration. The objective of the present work is to develop a drug delivery system based on aminated mesoporous silica nanoparticles (AMSN) and zein, a plant protein for the co-delivery of 5-Fluorouracil (5-FU) and curcumin (CUR). The AMSN was obtained by the co-condensation method, which can accommodate CUR in its pores. Then the silica core was coated with glycyrrhetinic acid conjugated zein nanoparticle, which could act as a pH-responsive gatekeeper for AMSN as well as a carrier for 5-FU. The structure of the hybrid nanoparticle was characterized by FT-IR, XRD, SEM, TEM, DLS and TG analyses. The release studies were carried out at pH 7.4 and 5.5. The greater extent of drug release occurred at pH 5.5. About 78.00% of drug release happened within 120\xa0h for 5-FU and 71.30% within 120\xa0h for CUR. The in vitro release of drugs was analyzed using Peppas s empirical equation to understand the release mechanism. In vitro cell viability studies were conducted using MTT assay on HepG2 liver cancer cells and 3T3-L1 normal cells. At 1000\xa0μg/mL, the drug carrier shows greater than 90.00% cell viability and AMSN-CUR/Z-GA-5-FU showed a higher toxicity of 68.80%. The results demonstrate that the prepared material is an efficient DDS for anticancer activity.