Exploration of ZnO decorated g-C3N4 amphiphilic anticancer drugs for antiproliferative activity against human cervical cancer

Abstract

Chemotherapeutic treatment of patients with cervical cancer cells often leads to severe side effects such as high drug toxicity to immune cells, poor penetration of chemotherapeutics across the blood, and lack of cancer selectivity. As a result, it is imperative to develop novel cancer treatment drugs that are free of side effects and toxicity. Hydrophobic-hydrophilic combinational anticancer medicines for chemotherapy have been recently introduced because they minimize multidrug resistance and side effects as a result of reduced dosage of each component in a drug and solubility in water increases. In this work, hydrophobic g-C3N4 (GCN) nanosheets decorated with hydrophilic ZnO (ZN) nanoparticles were fabricated via a two-step self-assembly process. The synthesized ZN@GCN nanocomposites were subsequently characterized by Powder X-ray diffraction analysis, Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), High-resolution Transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), selected area electron diffraction (SAED), Energy-Dispersive X-ray Analysis (EDAX), and Dynamic Light Scattering (DLS) for a crystal structure, functional group, surface morphology, elemental composition, particle size, polydispersity index, and zeta potential analysis. Furthermore, the antiproliferative effects of synthesized ZN@GCN nanocomposites in a human cervical cancer cell line (HeLa) were tested by MTT assay. The experiments revealed dose and time-dependent considerable cytotoxicity activity of the nanocomposites in the growing cells, with an IC50 value of 77.80 ± 2.75 μg/ml after 24 h incubation time. The apoptotic impact of ZN@GCN nanocomposite is achieved by the generation of free radicals; which potentially involves the disruption of mitochondrial membrane, cell damage, and DNA damage in HeLa cells. The amphiphilic ZN@GCN nanocomposite could be a promising anticancer drug, according to the observed properties and results obtained in our in vitro assay testing. Further research at the molecular level could point to its clinical promise in nanomedicine for the treatment of cervical cancer.