Transferrin-Conjugated Nanodiamond As an Intracellular Transporter of Chemotherapeutic Drug and Targeting Therapy for Cancer Cells

Abstract

FND-PEG-Tf can potentially be utilized in targeted cancer cell imaging and effective drug delivery for cancer therapy.

Nanodiamond-conjugated transferrin as chemotherapeutic drug delivery

“…It is an extension of our previous studies of ND-DOX/ND-Tf in vitro anti-cancer efficacy [9,27]. Furthermore, it is also a deeper research on our previous report in transferrin-conjugated nanodiamond as an intracellular transporter of chemotherapeutic drug and targeting therapy for cancer cells [26], where the PEGylated FND conjugated with Tf (FND-PEG-Tf) as a drug delivery carrier, DOX is physically adsorbed onto the FND-PEG-Tf to obtain FND-PEG-Tf-DOX nanoparticles, and the amount of DOX adsorbed is only 10 μg/mg. In addition, unfortunately, only its effects on cell activity in vitro were discussed.…”

“…However, fortunately, the carboxylated ND prepared as previously described can be covalently conjugated with biocompatible polymers to increase the dispersity and stability of ND or adsorb drug to change zeta potential to deliver drug into cells [1,2,25,26,29,30]. In view to previous discuss of ND-Tf, ND-DOX and ND-PEG-Tf-DOX, the strategy to obtain ND-(Tf-DOX) nanomedicine was planned.…”

“…The interaction of transferrin and transferrin-receptor has therefore been acted as a potential efficient pathway for the cellular uptake of drugs and genes [17][18][19]. Based on the strategies, an attractive formulation for specific cellular uptake and targeted drug delivery was designed by Tf-functionalized nanomaterials [20][21][22][23][24], where the nanoparticles including quantum dots/rods [25], gold nanoparticles and nanodiamond were conjugated with Tf for imaging [26,27], and cancer diagnosis and biological labeling applications have been emerged as a promising class of tools. It is worth noting that the most promising and exciting applications of such nanomaterials involving in their potential utilization of Tf-functionalized [20][21][22][23][24][25], in contrast, little information has been seen about transferrin-conjugated nanoparticles indeed delivery drug for cancer cells therapy.…”

Cetuximab‐conjugated nanodiamonds drug delivery system for enhanced targeting therapy and 3D Raman imaging

“…A wide range of targeting DDS have been investigated to enhance cancer treatment through targeted delivery . In order to meet the challenges in enhancing targeted efficiency, these DDS were usually conjugated with specific targeting ligands that could selectively bind to their well‐defined reaction sites on cancer cells . As a result, the selection of targets with abundant expression and signal amplification properties is crucial for the successful application of targeting DDS.…”

Nanodiamond‐Mediated Intercellular Transport of Proteins through Membrane Tunneling Nanotubes

“…The NV − fluorescence is perfectly photostable without photobleaching and photoblinking, making it an ideal nanoprobe for long‐term imaging and tracking applications . Another important characteristic of FND is that its surface can be readily conjugated with proteins (such as transferrin, streptavidin, or yolk lipoprotein either covalently or non‐covalently without significantly altering its fluorescence property. The full loading capacity of a single 100‐nm FND for globular proteins of 3 nm in diameter is close to 2000 molecules per particle.…”