Chitosan-based pH-sensitive semi-interpenetrating network nanoparticles as a sustained release matrix for anticancer drug delivery

Abstract

Chitosan-based nanoparticles have demonstrated a growing potential for use in the drug delivery systems due to their remarkable versatility. To enhance the effectiveness of chitosan-based nanoparticles for stimulus-responsive anticancer drug delivery, a novel pH-sensitive semi-interpenetrating networks (semi-IPN) of chitosan-poly(1-vinyl imidazole) (CS-PVIm) and Chitosan-poly(methacrylic-acid) (CS-PMAA) nanoparticles were synthesized through free radical polymerization. The semi-IPN nanoparticles were analyzed to evaluate their suitability as drug carrier. The SEM analysis revealed that the nanoparticles were spherical and within the nanoscale size range. The average particle size measured by DLS for CS-PMAA nanoparticles was 107.9 nm without the drug and 175.2 nm after the drug encapsulation. CS-PVIm-nanoparticles had an average size of 138.32 nm, which was increased to 165.84 nm after the drug loading. ATR-FTIR confirmed the formation of CS-PVIm and CS-PMAA nanoparticles. Cytotoxicity analysis showed that the nanoparticles are biocompatible, with over 95 % of cell survival for the HeLa cell lines. Further, Doxorubicin-hydrochloride (Dox) loaded nanoparticles exhibited sustained drug release caused by the protonation and deprotonation of their functional groups based on pH change. The CS-PVIm-nanoparticles showed encapsulation efficiency (EE) of 57 %, whereas EE of CS-PMAA-nanoparticles were 52 %, respectively. This research presents a straightforward method for producing intelligent pH-responsive semi-IPN-nanoparticles tailored for anticancer drug delivery.