1Assistant Professor, Department of Botany, Shri Sadguru Gangageer Maharaj Science, Gautam Arts & Sanjivani Commerce College, Kopargaon, Dist. Ahmednagar, Maharashtra, India
2Associate professor, Department of Botany, Rabindranath Tagore university, dist:-Hojai, Assam, Pin 782435
3PG Scholar, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Adichunchanagiri University, BGS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, Mandya, Karnataka, India 571448
4*Prof. Shalet Benvin, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, College: Adichunchanagiri BGS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, Mandya, Karnataka, India, 571448, E-mail: shaletbenvin@gmail.com
Conventional chemotherapy for cancer treatment suffers from three major problems which include systemic toxicity and poor drug absorption and its inability to target specific tumors. Researchers developed nanoparticle-based drug delivery systems (NDDS) to solve these problems. The system achieves controlled drug release and enhanced drug absorption through the EPR mechanism and delivers drugs directly to specific cells. The researchers conducted a study to develop and test PLGA-based nanoparticles that carry docetaxel (DTX) as a breast cancer treatment, which they designed to use folic acid (FA) for receptor-based active drug delivery. The researchers produced DTX-loaded PLGA nanoparticles through the nanoprecipitation method, which they analyzed to determine their particle size and zeta potential and polydispersity index (PDI) and encapsulation efficiency (EE%) and morphology through dynamic light scattering (DLS) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) analysis. The researchers tested the drug release of the sample by using phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) at two different pH values which included 7.4 and 5.0. The researchers used the MTT assay to study cytotoxicity effects on MCF-7 breast cancer cells and L929 normal fibroblast cells, while they tracked cellular uptake through confocal microscopy with rhodamine B-labeled nanoparticles.
The optimized DTX-FA-PLGA-NPs showed a particle size of 182.4 nanometers with a standard deviation of 6.3 nanometers and a zeta potential measurement of −28.7 millivolts with a standard deviation of 1.4 millivolts and a PDI measurement of 0.18 with a standard deviation of 0.03 and an EE measurement of 87.6 with a standard deviation of 2.1 percent. The TEM analysis showed that the particles had a spherical shape and their surfaces appeared smooth. The in-vitro release profiles showed a dual phase pattern which started with an initial burst release of approximately 28 percent within four hours and continued until 85 percent of the substance was released after 72 hours with an increased release rate occurring at pH 5.0 which simulated the conditions found inside endosomes. The MTT assay showed that DTX-FA-PLGA-NPs had an IC50 value of 38.5 nM against MCF-7 cells which was significantly less than the IC50 value of free DTX which measured 112.3 nM and the IC50 value of non-targeted nanoparticles which measured 79.4 nM. The L929 cells showed no signs of cytotoxicity at all. The study demonstrated that FA-functionalized nanoparticles could be better internalized by MCF-7 cells which highly express folate receptors according to confocal microscopy results.
The PLGA nanoparticles which have FA functionality show potential as a biocompatible delivery system that targets docetaxel to breast cancer cells while achieving better cancer cell killing effects and selective targeting abilities than both the free drug and the non-targeted drug delivery systems. The research findings require in-vivo studies to assess their potential for practical applications.
Keywords: Nanoparticles; Drug Delivery; PLGA; Docetaxel; Cancer Therapy; Folic Acid Targeting; MTT Assay; In-Vitro Evaluation; EPR Effect.
How to cite this article: Admuthe NB, Saikia M, B N P, Benvin S. Nanoparticle-Based Drug Delivery Systems for Cancer Therapy: Formulation and In-Vitro Evaluation. Int J Drug Deliv Technol. 2026; 16(8s): 378-384; DOI: 10.25258/ijddt.16.8s.50
Source of support: Nil.
Conflict of interest: None