Glycyrrhetinic acid-functionalized mesoporous silica nanoparticles as hepatocellular carcinoma-targeted drug carrier

Abstract

In this study, a glycyrrhetinic acid-functionalized mesoporous silica nanoparticle (MSN-GA) was prepared for active tumor targeting. MSN-GA exhibited satisfactory loading capacity for insoluble drugs, uniform size distribution, and specific tumor cell targeting. Glycyrrhetinic acid, a hepatocellular carcinoma-targeting group, was covalently decorated on the surface of MSN via an amido bond. The successful synthesis of MSN-GA was validated by the results of Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and zeta potential measurement. TEM images revealed the spherical morphology and uniform size distribution of the naked MSN and MSN-GA. Curcumin (CUR), an insoluble model drug, was loaded into MSN-GA (denoted as MSN-GA-CUR) with a high-loading capacity (8.78%±1.24%). The results of the in vitro cellular experiment demonstrated that MSN-GA-CUR significantly enhanced cytotoxicity and cellular uptake toward hepatocellular carcinoma (HepG2) cells via a specific GA receptor-mediated endocytosis mechanism. The results of this study provide a promising nanoplatform for the targeting of hepatocellular carcinoma.

Novel functionalized nanoparticles for tumor-targeting co-delivery of doxorubicin and siRNA to enhance cancer therapy

“…2 However, the traditional chemotherapeutic drugs are generally nonspecific and have no ability to discriminate between cancer cells and normal cells, which frequently causes systemic side effects. 3 To improve these shortcomings, a large number of nanoscale drug carriers, such as polymeric nanomicelles, inorganic nanoparticles and liposomes and so on, have been developed to achieve the tumor-targeted delivery of chemotherapeutic drugs. [4][5][6] Among them, selenium nanoparticles (SeNPs) have received an increasing attention as drug carriers owing to their biocompatibility, low toxicity, simple synthesis process, in vivo degradability and excellent chemopreventive effects.…”

Nanomedicine in Hepatocellular Carcinoma: A New Frontier in Targeted Cancer Treatment

“…Along with that, selectively targeting tumoral hepatocytes defines another obstacle. Therefore, a selectively targeted therapy is desirable in order to selectively target the affected cells while reducing the toxicity of the therapy [48] [108][109][110][111][112][113][114][115][116][117][118], silver NPs [119][120][121][122], zinc oxide NPs [123], etc. [47].…”

Emerging and Innovative Theranostic Approaches for Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles in Hepatocellular Carcinoma: Current Status and Advances

“…Although DOX in MSNs had showed a good antitumor effects, other drugs that is more sensitive for HCC should be explored. It's worth noting that many hydrophobic drugs loaded in MSNs overcome their poor water solubility, including paclitaxel (Li et al, 2010;He et al, 2017;, curcumin (Lv et al, 2017;Xing et al, 2018), berberine (Yue et al, 2018b), and so on. Co-delivery multiple drugs have been recognized as a more efficient treatment than a single drug.…”