Green synthesis of bimetallic ZnO\u2013CuO nanoparticles and their cytotoxicity properties

Yan Cao,M A El-Shorbagy,Abolfazl Heydari,Hajar Q Alijani,Farnaz Farzaneh Dehkordi,Siavash Iravani,Ehsan Bahonar,Miroslav Slouf,Mana Zakeri,Sanaz Khatami,Hayder A Dhahad,Mahin Naderifar,Mehrdad Khatami

doi:10.1038/s41598-021-02937-1

Abstract

In this study, a simple and green strategy was reported to prepare bimetallic nanoparticles (NPs) by the combination of zinc oxide (ZnO) and copper oxide (CuO) using Sambucus nigra L. extract. The physicochemical properties of these NPs such as crystal structure, size, and morphology were studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission gun scanning electron microscopy (FEG-SEM), and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The results suggested that these NPs contained polygonal ZnO NPs with hexagonal phase and spherical CuO NPs with monoclinic phase. The anticancer activity of the prepared bimetallic NPs was evaluated against lung and human melanoma cell lines based on MTT assay. As a result, the bimetallic ZnO/CuO NPs exhibited high toxicity on melanoma cancer cells while their toxicity on lung cancer cells was low.

Highlights

Cancer can cause the unregulated cell growth with high potential to invade and spread to other cells and tissues of the body by the lymph system and blood via a metastatic process[1,2]
The synthesized bimetallic NPs have been characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission gun scanning electron microscopy (FEG-SEM), and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) combined with energy dispersive analysis of X-rays (EDX) and selected area electron diffraction (SAED)
The high purity of these bimetallic NPs as well as the monoclinic and hexagonal crystalline structures of zinc oxide (ZnO) and CuO NPs were confirmed by XRD and TEM/SAED diffractograms

Summary

Introduction

Cancer can cause the unregulated cell growth with high potential to invade and spread to other cells and tissues of the body by the lymph system and blood via a metastatic process[1,2]. In one study, Ahamed et al showed that CuO NPs had the genotoxic toxicity on A549 cells These metallic NPs caused apoptosis via lipid peroxidation and oxidative stress in lung cancer cells. Elemike et al demonstrated that bimetallic ZnO/CuO synthesized by low cost and green method had less anticancer effects on Hela cancer cells than the control drug 5-fluorouracil[52]. Green synthesis of bimetallic ZnO/CuO using Sambucus nigra L. plant extract was illustrated, with the advantages of simplicity, cost-effectiveness, low temperature, eco-friendliness, desirable anticancer properties, and efficient cytotoxicity of biogenic ZnO/CuO N Ps51. Green and eco-friendly synthetic strategies are deployed instead of conventional industrial manufacturing methods to eliminate/prevent hazardous materials and reduce expensive/complex instruments and materials These eco-friendly methods have some benefits compared to the conventional physicochemical approaches such as simplicity, rapidness, cost-effectiveness, low toxicity, and environmentally friendliness. The anticancer activity of these NPs have been evaluated on human melanoma cell line (A375) and human lung cancer (A549)

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion