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Caffeine based N‐heterocyclic carbene (NHC)‐silver complex anchored on magnetic nanoparticles (MNP‐Caff‐NHC@Ag complex) has been prepared by covalent grafting of caffeine on the surface of chloro‐functionalized Fe3O4 magnetic nanoparticles followed by complexation with silver (I) acetate. The MNP‐Caff‐NHC@Ag complex has been characterized by Fourier transform infrared (FT‐IR) spectroscopy, energy‐dispersive X‐ray (EDX) spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X‐ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) analysis. The MNP‐Caff‐NHC@Ag complex displayed significant in vitro anticancer activity against human hepatocarcinoma HepG2 cell line and antibacterial activity against Escherichia coli (NCIM‐2832), Staphylococcus aureus (NCIM‐2654) and Bacillus cereus (NCIM‐2703). The hyperthermia studies revealed that MNP‐Caff‐NHC@Ag complex achieved good therapeutic temperature (47 °C) under physiological safe range of field and frequency thereby forecasting potential applications as heating mediators in magnetic hyperthermia for selectively killing of cancer cells.

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Many nutraceuticals are highly potent, nontoxic, bioactive agents present in dietary vegetables, fruits and spices. They exhibit immune‐modulatory, antioxidant and anticancer activity. The major disadvantage of nutraceuticals is their low aqueous solubility and hence poor bioavailability hindering their therapeutic applications. In the present work, we herein report preparation of nanoparticles of bioactive nutraceuticals such as curcumin (1), quercetin (2), anthraquinone (3), xanthone (4), flavone (5) and vanillin (6) with a view to improve their aqueous‐phase solubility and evaluate their anticancer, antiangiogenic and antioxidant activities. The nanoparticles were prepared by controlled flow rate reprecipitation technique and characterized by spectral and microscopic techniques. Most of the nanoparticles displayed higher in‐vitro anticancer, antioxidant and in‐ovo antiangiogenic activities as compared to the corresponding bulk compounds. The biological activities of nutraceuticals are marked increased by particle size reduction to the nanoscale.

A multi‐step synthesis and characterization of nano‐magnetic copper complexes [Nano‐magnetite‐Lys@Cu(PPh3)I] and [Nano‐magnetite‐Arg@Cu(PPh3)I] with size of ∼ 12 nm and∼15 nm is reported. Complexes displayed significant anti‐cancer activity against MCF‐7 breast cancer cells with IC50 of 104.38 μg/mL and 95.81 μg/mL respectively as compared to the standard drug cis‐platin (IC50=88.91 μg/mL). The hyperthermia studies of both the complexes revealed remarkable specific absorption rate (SAR) values of 36.83‐85.81 W/g and 97.67‐125.58 W/g with therapeutic temperature of 48 °C and 43 °C respectively. The studies revealed that both the complexes can act as a double edged sword in anti‐breast cancer therapy through combined effect of hyperthermia and chemotherapy.