Evaluation of metal nanoparticles for drug delivery systems

Diminazene aceturate is a trypanocide with unwanted toxicity and limited efficacy. It was reasoned that conjugating diminazene aceturate to functionalized nanoparticle would lower untoward toxicity while improving selectivity and therapeutic efficacy. Silver and gold nanoparticles were evaluated for their capacities to serve as carriers for diminazene aceturate. The silver and gold nanoparticles were synthesized, functionalized and coupled to diminazene aceturate following established protocols. The nanoparticle conjugates were characterized. The free diminazene aceturate and drug conjugated nanoparticles were subsequently evaluated for cytotoxicity in vitro. The characterizations by transmission electron microscopy or UV/Vis spectroscopy revealed that conjugation of diminazene aceturate to silver or gold nanoparticles was successful. Evaluation for cytotoxic actions in vitro demonstrated no significance difference between free diminazene aceturate and the conjugates. Our data suggest that surface modified metal nanoparticles could be optimized for drug delivery systems.