Sustained antioxidant activity of quercetin-loaded lipid-core nanocapsules

J Nanosci Nanotechnol. 2012 Mar;12(3):2874-80. doi: 10.1166/jnn.2012.5770.

Abstract

Lipid-core nanocapsules (LNC) are vesicular nanocarriers prepared by solvent displacement. LNC have been previously prepared using medium-chain triglyceride and sorbitan monostearate as liquid and solid lipophilic components dispersed in the core, surrounded by poly(epsilon-caprolactone) (PCL). Our objective was to investigate the antioxidant activity of LNC containing quercetin (QUE), a radical scavenger, prepared with octyl methoxycinnamate and sorbitan monostearate as lipophilic core components and PCL as the polymer wall. We selected Saccharomyces cerevisae cells as the proposed biological model. QUE-LNC presented z-average diameter of 212 nm, pH of 5.51 and zeta potential of -11 mV. Multiple light scattering analysis (TurbiscanLab) showed a photon path length of 172 microm. Furthermore, a validated turbidimetric study determined that the density of particles in suspension was 1.66 x 10(13). DSC analysis showed that the melting temperature of PCL shifted to lower values when in contact with octyl methoxycinnamate indicating a molecular interaction. After 1 h (7 h), the QUE-LNC formulation and QUE solution incubated with H2O2 showed cell survival of 84.4% (87.7%) and 65.6% (7.3%), respectively. After 35 h of incubation, cell survival was 31.7% and 0.9%, respectively. The QUE-LNC showed sustained antioxidant activity and potential as a nanostructured material to formulate final products.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Antioxidants / pharmacology*
  • Calorimetry, Differential Scanning
  • Hydrogen-Ion Concentration
  • Lipids / chemistry*
  • Microscopy, Electron, Transmission
  • Nanocapsules*
  • Quercetin / pharmacology*
  • Saccharomyces cerevisiae / drug effects
  • Spectrophotometry, Ultraviolet

Substances

  • Antioxidants
  • Lipids
  • Nanocapsules
  • Quercetin