Magnetic assisted curcumin drug delivery using folate receptor targeted hybrid casein-calcium ferrite nanocarrier

Abstract

Receptor targeted nanocarriers in the multimodal delivery of cancer therapeutics with minimal side effects are being intensively researched. In this study, folate receptor targeted hybrid protein inorganic nanocarrier was investigated for magnetic-assisted curcumin drug delivery. The protein carrier, casein was hybridized with superparamagnetic calcium ferrite nanoparticles (CFNP) in which the anti-cancer drug, curcumin (Cur) was encapsulated. Finally, folic acid (FA) was conjugated to enable receptor-mediated endocytosis. The synthesized materials were characterized using XRD, FTIR, SEM, VSM and DLS analysis confirming their formulation. The drug loading parameters were optimized by Taguchi technique. Curcumin release from the carrier was studied under the influence of pH, initial drug concentrations and magnetic field. Drug release rate was higher in acidic conditions, increased drug concentrations and under the influence of magnetic field. The drug release mechanism from the carrier were proposed using different kinetic models. Biocompatibility and cytotoxicity tests were performed for the synthesized drug carrier systems using L929 murine fibroblast and MCF-7 breast cancer cells, respectively. The IC50 value reduced nearly six fold for MCF-7 cells, for casein-Cur with FA conjugation in comparison to the carrier without FA. The study clearly demonstrated casein-CFNP-Cur-FA as a novel potential formulation for targeted drug delivery.