Abstract
Providing an efficient system for drug delivery and chemotherapy has always been an important issue. Modification of the surface of silica nanoparticles (SiO2) provides an opportunity for achieving stimulus-sensitive drug delivery system. Here, we have modified the surface of SiO2 using hydrogen bonding interactions by employing an aqueous two-phase system (ATPS) based on polyethylene glycol and lysine. This novel biocompatible ATPS provides an environment for simultaneous drug encapsulation, SiO2 modification, and drug partitioning in one pot. Addition of SiO2 to ATPS increased the partitioning of doxorubicin (DOX) as an anti-cancer drug from 47.92 in the absence of nanoparticles to 92.33 due to the interactions between drug and nanoparticles. The formation of nanoformulation and its characteristics were investigated applying microscopy, spectroscopy and thermal analysis. Drug release study demonstrated that DOX is loaded on nanoformulations efficiently with an encapsulation efficiency of 63.84% and shows lower release in physiological environment compared to the unmodified nanoparticles. While in acidic conditions of pH 5.5, significant increase was observed in the release profile. MTT assay on MCF-7 cancer cells confirmed that the nanoformulations were non-toxic and DOX-loaded nanocarrier showed anti-cancer behavior. These results indicate that the prepared nanoformulations are promising nanocarriers for controlled drug release purposes.
Partitioning of bovine lactoferrin in aqueous two-phase system containing poly(ethylene glycol) and sodium citrate