Co encapsulated Liposome of Artemisinin Analogue and Curcumin for Cytotoxic Potential

Abstract

Across the globe and in India, cancer drug delivery has focused using novel carrier system due to their effective encapsulation and release controlled property with the minimum side-effect. The flexibility of modification in liposomes makes them a useful drug delivery system in various fields like protein /drug delivery, antiviral therapy, tumor therapy, gene delivery, vaccine delivery, cosmetics, dermatology and others. However, there are some stability issues and newlineincomplete drug releases at target site are attached with liposome. In order to achieve maximum or appropriate therapeutic response, the drug in required quantity should be available to the target cells in the disease like cancer. Therefore, considering the example of cancer, delivery of drug newlinewith liposome to the site should be released in therapeutic concentration. For this purpose, internal stimuli can be used effectively to enhance the release of drug from liposome. Artesunate (ART) and curcumin (CUR) are proved natural herbal lead chemotherapeutics used as Chinese and Indian food respectively. But due to its low absorption and the poor bioavailability newlinelimits its clinical efficacy. The object of the present work was to investigate the cytotoxic potential of these herbal lead molecules in the co-encapsulated liposome formulation. It is hypothesized that liposomes co-encapsulating Artesunate and Curcumin in a synergistic ratio newlinewould be an appropriate drug delivery system to treat breast cancer effectively. newlineFirst, we docked the Artesunate and Curcumin with two pro-carcinogenic ligands, to check the binding energy and interaction between them. We confirmed the cell viability of free drug combination before formulation and determined the IC50 values on two cell lines (MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231). IC50 value for ART and CUR was found to be 0.65 ± 0.22and#956;g/ml and 3.09 ± 0.84and#956;g/ml respectively. Artesunate and Curcumin co-encapsulated conventional and PEGylated liposomes were formulated and characterized. Lipid and cholesterol molar ratio were optimized on the basi newline