Development and effectiveness of targeted peptide carrier formulation containing aunps and doxorubicin in the treatment of breast cancer

Objective: Recently, there has been a significant increase in research for targeted cancer treatments in which therapeutic agents are conjugated with nanoparticles and delivered to tumor sites. In particular, Au NPs are frequently preferred because they are obtained in high yield, as well as being non-cytotoxic and can be easily functionalized with various surface modifications. Material and Methods: In this study, peptide carrier doxorubicin loaded gold nanoparticles (AuPepDox NPs) that can recognize estrogen receptor positive breast cancer cells were synthesized and their efficacy was tested on MCF-7 cells. AuPepDox NPs in MCF-7 cells were incubated at different doses for 24 hours and Bax, Blc-2 protein levels were analyzed by western blot for mitochondrial apoptotic effect. AuPepDox NPs were synthesized in 88.77% yield and showed maximum absorption of orange colors at 510 nm. Results: Morphological evaluations of AuPepDox NPs were made in SEM analysis and it was determined that they were spherical in shape and their average size was 117.55 ± 24.14 nm. The potential charge for AuPepDox NPs as a result of zeta-sizer analysis was found as -21.34 ± 2.81 mV. AupepDox NPs showed a release of 19.39% doxorubicin at pH 7.4 and 81.97% at pH 5.5 after 72 hours. The IC50 concentration was calculated as 99.72 µM for AuPepDox NPs in 24 hours of incubation in MCF-7 cells, and it was found that it showed more cytotoxic effect than free doxorubicin. It was found that AuPepDox NPs induced apoptosis better than equivalent free doxorubicin in Bax/Bcl-2 ratio. Conclusion: In the current study, it was shown that AuPepDox NPs, which show good release at acidic pH, induce apoptosis in MCF-7 cells better than equivalent doxorubicin. This work can contribute to clinical studies in the development of drugs that can release in the acidic environment of cancer cells. Key Words: Breast cancer, Doxorubucin, Gold nanoparticles, MCF-7