Targeted drug delivery systems are one of the most promising alternatives for the
cancer therapy. Rapid developments on nanomedicine facilitated the creation of novel nanotherapeutics by using different nanomaterials. Especially
polymer based nanoparticles are convenient for this purpose. In this study; a natural
polymer (poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate), PHBHHX) was used as a base matrix for the production of a novel nanotherapeutic including
antineoplastic agent,
Etoposide and attached
folic acid as a
ligand on the nanoparticles. Modified
solvent evaporation technique was used for the production of PHBHHX nanoparticles and the average size of the obtained PHBHHX nanoparticles were observed in the range of 180 nm and 1.5 μm by the change in experimental conditions (i.e., homogenization rate,
surfactant concentration and
polymer/
solvent ratio). By the increase in homogenization rate and
surfactant concentration, size of the nanoparticles was decreased, while the size was increased by the increase in
polymer/
solvent ratio.
Drug loading ratio was also found to be highly affected by
polymer/
drug ratio. Surface charge of the prepared nanoparticles was also investigated by zeta potential measurements. In the cytotoxicity tests;
Etoposide loaded and
folic acid attached PHBHHX nanoparticles were observed as more effective on HeLa cells than
Etoposide loaded PHBHHX nanoparticles without attached
folic acid. The cytotoxicity of
folic acid conjugated PHBHHX nanoparticles to
cancer cells was found to be much higher than that of normal fibroblast cells, demonstrating that the
folate conjugated nanoparticles has the ability to selectively target to
cancer cells. In addition, apoptotic/necrotic activities were evaluated for all formulations of the PHBHHX nanoparticles and parallel results with cytotoxicity tests were obtained. These studies demonstrate that the
folic acid attached and
Etoposide loaded PHBHHX nanoparticles seem as promising for the targeted
cancer therapy.