Apoptosis Induction, Cell Cycle Arrest and Anti-Cancer Potential of Tamoxifen-Curcumin Loaded Niosomes Against MCF-7 Cancer Cells.

Background & Objective: Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. One of the most effective treatments for breast cancer is chemotherapy, in which specific drugs destroy the mass and its proliferation is inhibited. Chemotherapy is the most effective adjunctive therapy when multiple medications are used concurrently. Also, combining the drugs with nanocarrier has become an important strategy in targeted therapy. This study is designed to assess the apoptosis induction, cell cycle arrest, and anti-cancer potential of Tamoxifen-Curcumin-loaded niosomes against MCF-7 Cancer Cells. Methods: A novel niosomal formulation of tamoxifen-curcumin with Span 80 and lipid to drug ratio of 20 was employed. The MCF-7 cells were cultured and then treated with IC50 value of tamoxifen-curcumin-loaded niosomes, the combination of tamoxifen and curcumin, tamoxifen, and curcumin alone. Flow cytometry, Real-Time PCR, and cell cycle analysis tests were conducted to evaluate the induction of apoptosis. Results: Drug-loaded niosomes caused up-regulation of bax and p53 genes and down-regulation of bcl2 gene. Flow cytometry studies showed that niosomes containing tamoxifen-curcumin increased apoptosis rate in MCF-7 cells compared to the combination of tamoxifen and curcumin owing to the synergistic effect between the two drugs along with higher cell uptake by formulation niosomal. These results were also confirmed by cell cycle analysis. Conclusion: Co-delivery of curcumin and tamoxifen using optimized niosomal formulation revealed that at acidic pH of MCF-7 cancer cells, released drugs from niosomal carriers would be more effective than physiological pH. This feature of niosomal nanoparticles can reduce the side effects of drugs in normal cells. Niosomal nanoparticles might be used as a biological anti-cancer factor in treatment of breast cancer.

In vitro cytotoxicity and anti-cancer drug release behavior of methionine-coated magnetite nanoparticles as carriers.

A novel and specific drug delivery for in vitro cancer targeted are developed successfully by a simple one-step method. A CoFe2O4@Methionine core-shell nanoparticle was prepared by the reflux assay which amino acid in the surface makes ferrite biocompatible, enhances its chemical stability, and improves the drug-loading capacity. The synthesized nanoparticles were characterized using FTIR, TGA, XRD, SEM, TEM, and VSM which coating amino acid on the surface of CoFe2O4 was confirmed by XRD and TGA. The appearance of a new peak for C≡N confirms the formation of Letrozole-loaded carrier in the FTIR. The vibrating sample magnetometer of both bare CoFe2O4 and Methionine-coated CoFe2O4 nanoparticles exhibited room-temperature superparamagnetic behavior with a saturation value of 46 emu/g and 16.8 emu/g, respectively. The morphology and size of samples were characterized by SEM and TEM that the average size of the particle was around 28-29 nm. The loading of Letrozole and the effect of pH (5, 7.4) on the release behavior of the carrier was studied. The result of the drug release in pH is equal to 5 was about 88% which higher than pH is equal to 7.4. Also, the preparation had been evaluated for determining its cytotoxicity using MCF-7, MDA-MB-231, and MCF10A cells as an in vitro model, and the result vitro experiments showed that CoFe2O4@Methionine could significantly reduce cancer in cells model. These results demonstrate that core-shell nanoparticle was prepared is biocompatible and have potential use as drug delivery.

Niosomes: a novel targeted drug delivery system for cancer.

Recently, nanotechnology is involved in various fields of science, of which medicine is one of the most obvious. The use of nanoparticles in the process of treating and diagnosing diseases has created a novel way of therapeutic strategies with effective mechanisms of action. Also, due to the remarkable progress of personalized medicine, the effort is to reduce the side effects of treatment paths as much as possible and to provide targeted treatments. Therefore, the targeted delivery of drugs is important in different diseases, especially in patients who receive combined drugs, because the delivery of different drug structures requires different systems so that there is no change in the drug and its effectiveness. Niosomes are polymeric nanoparticles that show favorable characteristics in drug delivery. In addition to biocompatibility and high absorption, these nanoparticles also provide the possibility of reducing the drug dosage and targeting the release of drugs, as well as the delivery of both hydrophilic and lipophilic drugs by Niosome vesicles. Since various factors such as components, preparation, and optimization methods are effective in the size and formation of niosomal structures, in this review, the characteristics related to niosome vesicles were first examined and then the in silico tools for designing, prediction, and optimization were explained. Finally, anticancer drugs delivered by niosomes were compared and discussed to be a suitable model for designing therapeutic strategies. In this research, it has been tried to examine all the aspects required for drug delivery engineering using niosomes and finally, by presenting clinical examples of the use of these nanocarriers in cancer, its clinical characteristics were also expressed.

Preparation, physicochemical properties, in vitro evaluation and release behavior of cephalexin-loaded niosomes.

In this study, optimized cephalexin-loaded niosomal formulations based on span 60 and tween 60 were prepared as a promising drug carrier system. The niosomal formulations were characterized using a series of techniques such as scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering, and zeta potential measurement. The size and drug encapsulation efficiency are determined by the type and composition of surfactant. The developed niosomal formulations showed great storage stability up to 30 days with low change in size and drug entrapment during the storage, making them potential candidates for real applications. Moreover, the prepared niosomes showed negligible cytotoxicity for HepG2 cells, measured by MTT assay. The antibacterial properties of cephalexin-loaded niosome were investigated using S. aureus and E. coli as gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria, respectively. The results showed that the encapsulation of antibiotic drug in niosomal formulation could enhance the antibacterial efficiency of the drug, where the minimum inhibitory concentration was droped from 8 µg/mL (cephalexin) to 4 µg/mL (cephalexin-loaded niosome) and from 4 µg/mL (cephalexin) to 1 µg/mL (cephalexin-loaded niosome) against E. coli and S. aureus, respectively. The findings of our study show that the improvement of cephalexin bioavailability and prolonged drug release profile could be obtained by niosomal formulation as a favorable antibiotic drug delivery system.