In vitro cytotoxicity and in vivo sub-acute oral toxicity assessment of porphyran reduced gold nanoparticles

Abstract

The aim of this study was to establish a toxicologic profile of gold nanoparticles (AuNP) (surface plasmon resonance at 520 nm and average particle size 14 ± 2 nm) synthesized using novel polysaccharide porphyran isolated from marine red algae. The toxicology profile includes in vitro cytotoxicity and in vivo sub-acute oral toxicity study (OECD guideline 407) of porphyran-reduced AuNP. In vitro cytotoxicity study of porphyran-reduced AuNP (10, 50 or 100 µM) was carried out employing normal monkey kidney cell line (VERO), which demonstrated a nontoxic nature of nanoparticles. Further, in vivo sub-acute oral toxicity study was performed with three different doses of AuNP (375, 750, and 1500 ppm kg⁻¹ day⁻¹) in Wistar rats up to 28 days. Results revealed that porphyran-reduced AuNP did not produce any body weight, hematological or biochemical abnormalities in rats. Hence, data indicated that porphyran-reduced AuNP can be considered as potential safe vehicles for drug delivery application.

Keywords:

• porphyran
• gold nanoparticles
• in vitro cytotoxicity
• in vivo sub-acute toxicity

Acknowledgments

V. Venkatpurwar would like to thank All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), Delhi, India, for providing National doctoral fellowship (NDF). Authors would like to thank Dr Alpana Moghe (Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, BVU, Pune) for cell line study.