Curcumin-Loaded Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles Markedly Enhanced Cytotoxicity in Hepatocellular Carcinoma Cells

Abstract

Curcumin, a natural polyphenol extracted from a perennial herb Curcuma longa has been verified for many physiological activities such as anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-tumor properties. The direct use of curcumin cytotoxicity studies are limited due to its unstable chemical structure, low bioavailability, easy oxidation, and degradation by ultraviolet (UV) light etc. Trying to overcome this problem, silica-encapsulated curcumin nanoparticles (SCNP) and chitosan with silica co-encapsulated curcumin nanoparticles (CSCNP) were prepared by silicification and biosilicification methods, respectively, and encapsulated curcumin within it. We investigated the antitumor properties of SCNP and CSCNP on different tumor cell lines. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis revealed that both SCNP and CSCNP were almost spherical in shape and the average particle size of CSCNP was 75.0 ± 14.62 nm, and SCNP was 61.7 ± 23.04 nm. The results show that CSCNP has more anti-oxidant activity as compared to curcumin and SCNP. The higher cytotoxicity towards different cancerous cell lines was also observed in CSCNP treated tumor cells. It was noted that the SCNP and CSCNP has a high percentage of IC50 values in Hep G2 cells. The encapsulation of curcumin improved instability, antioxidant activity, and antitumor activity. Our results demonstrated that nanoencapsulation of curcumin with silica and chitosan not only increase curcumin stability but also enhance its cytotoxic activity on hepatocellular carcinoma cells. On the basis of these primary studies, the curcumin-loaded nanoparticles appear to be promising as an innovative therapeutic material for the treatment of tumors.

Curcumin inhibits the growth of liver cancer by impairing myeloid‑derived suppressor cells in murine tumor tissues

“…In the present study, data obtained from the xenograft nude mouse model provided further evidence that curcumin effectively suppressed the growth of liver cancer. Similarly, numerous previous in vitro and in vivo studies have demonstrated that curcumin inhibits the growth cancer in both animals and humans ( 40 – 42 ), including hepatocellular carcinoma ( 43 ). Several reports have suggested that curcumin or its derivative alone or in combination with other drugs exhibit favorable anti-liver cancer activity ( 44 – 46 ).…”

Characterization and Antioxidant Activity Determination of Neutral and Acidic Polysaccharides from Panax Ginseng C. A. Meyer

“…Then, it forms a complex with ferric chloride, which shows absorbance at 700 nm [34]. Next, chelating activities of antioxidants were evaluated by inhibition in the formation of Fe 2+ -ferrozine complex, which has an absorbance at 562 nm [35]. EDTA was used as a positive control in this assay.…”

“…The ferrous ion chelating activity was measured by following the previously described method with a slight modification [35]. Briefly, 0.1 mL polysaccharide sample was added to 0.5 mL ferrous chloride (0.2 mM) and 0.2 mL ferrozine (5 mM), followed by incubation at room temperature for 10 min.…”

Enhancing curcumin's solubility and antibiofilm activityviasilica surface modification

“…47 Silica NPs were chosen as a nanoplatform given their low toxicity to both prokaryotes 48 and eukaryotes 49 and low environmental impact. 50 Despite the fact that, for silica NPs, curcumin is oen delivered in mesoporous silica [51][52][53] or added to the silica matrix itself, 54 here the compound is functionalised covalently only at the surface of the NPs. The NPs produced are shown to have little antibacterial effect, however a noticeable antibiolm activity.…”