Ionic liquids are an interesting class of materials that have recently been utilized as chemotherapeutic agents in
cancer therapy.
Aniline blue, a commonly used
biological staining agent, was used as a counter ion to trihexyltetradecylphosphonium, a known cytotoxic
cation. A facile, single step ion exchange reaction was performed to synthesize a fluorescent
ionic liquid, trihexyltetradecylphosphonium
aniline blue. Aqueous nanoparticles of this hydrophobic
ionic liquid were prepared using reprecipitationmethod. The newly synthesized
ionic liquid and subsequent nanoparticles were characterized using various spectroscopic techniques. Transmission electron microscopy and zeta potential measurements were performed to characterize the nanoparticles' morphology and surface charge. The photophysical properties of the nanoparticles and the parent
aniline blue compound were studied using absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy. Cell viability studies were conducted to investigate the cytotoxicity of the newly developed trihexyltetradecylphosphonium
aniline blue nanoparticles in human breast epithelial
cancer cell line (MCF-7) and its corresponding normal epithelial cell line (MCF-10A) in vitro. The results revealed that the synthesized ionic nanomedicines were more cytotoxic (lower IC50) than the parent chemotherapeutic compound in MCF-7 cells. Nanoparticles of the synthesized
ionic liquid were also shown to be more stable in both aqueous and cellular media and more selective than parent compounds towards
cancer cells.