Poly(amidoamine)‎-Cholesterol Conjugate Nanoparticles Obtained by Electrospraying as Novel Tamoxifen Delivery System

Abstract EN

A new poly(amidoamine)-cholesterol (PAA-cholesterol) conjugate was synthesized, characterized and used to produce nanoparticles by the electrospraying technique.

The electrospraying is a method of liquid atomization that consists in the dispersion of a solution into small charged droplets by an electric field.

Tuning the electrospraying process parameters spherical PAA-chol nanoparticles formed.

The PAA-cholesterol nanoparticles showed sizes lower than 500 nm and spherical shape.

The drug incorporation capacity was investigated using tamoxifen, a lipophilic anticancer drug, as model drug.

The incorporation of the tamoxifen did not affect the shape and sizes of nanoparticles showing a drug loading of 40%.

Tamoxifen-loaded nanoparticles exhibited a higher dose-dependent cytotoxicity than free tamoxifen, while blank nanoparticles did not show any cytotoxic effect at the same concentrations.

The electrospray technique might be proposed to produce tamoxifen-loaded PAA-chol nanoparticle in powder form without any excipient in a single step.