HSA-curcumin nanoparticles: a promising substitution for Curcumin as a Cancer chemoprevention and therapy

Many solutions have been evaluated to deal with “chemotherapy and radiation-resistant cancer cells’ as well as “severe complications of chemotherapy drugs”. One of these solutions is the use of herbal compounds with antioxidant properties. Among these antioxidant compounds, curcumin is identified as the strongest one to inhibit cancerous cells proliferation. However, its clinical trials have encountered many constraints, because curcumin is insoluble in water and unstable in physiological conditions. To overcome these limitations, in this study, curcumin was conjugated with human serum albumin (HSA) and its effects on breast cancer cell lines were also measured. After making of HSA-curcumin nanoparticles (NPs) by the desolvation technique, they were characterized by the FTIR, DLS, TEM, and SEM method. At the end, its anticancer effects have been examined using MTT test and apoptosis assay. The FTIR graph confirmed that curcumin and HSA have been conjugated along with each other. Particles size was reported to be 220 nm and 180 nm by DLS and SEM, respectively. The zeta potential of HSA-curcumin NPs was −7 mV, while it was −37 mV for curcumin. The MTT and apoptosis assay results indicated that the toxicity of HSA-curcumin NPs on the normal cell are less than curcumin; however, its anti-cancer effects on the cancer cells are much greater, compared to curcumin. HSA-curcumin NPs increase curcumin solubility in water as well as its stability in physiological and acidic conditions. These factors have the ability of overwhelming the limitations on using curcumin alone, and they could result in a significant increase in the toxicity of curcumin on the cancer cells without increasing its toxicity on the normal cells.