Al-doped zinc ferrite nanoparticles: Preparation and evaluation of thermal, structural, morphological and anticancer properties

Abstract

The aim of this study was to evaluate the thermal, structural, optical, morphological and anticancer properties of ZnFe2O4 (ZFO) and AlxZn1−xFe2O4 (x = 0.05) (ZAFO) nanoparticles. Zinc ferrite nanoparticles were prepared by chemical co-precipitation method, using polyethylene glycol (PEG) as the capping agent. The synthesized pure and Al-doped ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles were annealed at different temperatures such as 500, 600, 700 and 800 °C. X-ray diffraction analysis was used to determine lattice parameters like X-ray density, oxygen position parameter, distribution of cation among tetrahedral and octahedral sites, ionic radii, and edge lengths of the tetrahedral (A) and octahedral (B) sites and micro strain values. The calculated micro strain values were found to be decreasing with increasing annealing temperatures in both ZnFe2O4 and AlxZn1−xFe2O4 (x = 0.05) samples. The FTIR results confirmed ferrites tetrahedral (~540 cm−1) and octahedral sites (~431 cm−1) metal oxygen vibrations. The morphology of the synthesized ZnFe2O4 and AlxZn1−xFe2O4 (x = 0.05) nanoparticles were studied by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) and particle size was found to be<100 nm. Band gap energy at different temperatures were calculated using Tauc plots and found to be decreasing with increase in annealing temperatures for both ZnFe2O4 and AlxZn1−xFe2O4 (x = 0.05) nanoparticles. The anti-cancer properties were observed at the in vitro level by MTT (3-[4, 5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl]-2, 5 diphenyltetrozolium bromide) assay against human Breast cancer cell line, MCF-7 (Human Breast adenocarcinoma) and lung cancer cell line A549 (Human Lung Carcinoma). Among the pure and Al doped samples used in the present study, the ZnFe2O4 (ZFO-3) sample annealed at 700 °C showed less viability in A 549 (Human Lung Carcinoma), whereas AlxZn1−xFe2O4 (ZAFO-1) sample annealed at 500°C showed less viability in MCF-7 (Human Breast Adenocarcinoma). Toxicity studies have shown that ZnFe2O4 and AlxZn1−xFe2O4 (x = 0.05) NPs reduced cell viability and induced cell membrane damage dose dependently in the concentration range of 25–100 µg/mL