In‐Vitro Evaluation of Folic Acid Capped Gold Nanoformulations for Drug Delivery to Prostate Cancer

Abstract Development of effective nanoformulations is one of the captivated attentions in the area of healthcare applications. Drug encapsulated metal nanoparticles (AuNPs) is an impressive nanoformulations, which reduces the side effects, enrich the pharmacokinetic and enables the targeted drug delivery. Gold nanoformulations (FA‐AuNFs) receiving much consideration in biomedical research, owing to their unique physical and chemical properties with beneficial features including ease of synthesize, relatively low‐toxicity, and good biocompatibility. Herein, we aimed to establish a simple, one‐step synthesis of gold nanoformulations by chemical reduction method using folic acid (FA) as a capping and stabilizing agent. Further, folic acid capped AuNPs were encapsulated with the docetaxel (Dtx) (an anticancer drug). The surface structural formation, chemical bonding with chemical constituents and surface morphology of the FA‐AuNFs were extensively demonstrated by various analytical techniques. Raman and FT‐IR spectra reveal that the formation of folic acid and Dtx on the surface of synthesized FA‐AuNFs. FE‐SEM and HR‐TEM results suggest that the particles are spherical in shape with an average dimension of 3 nm and nanoformulations at 6 nm. The encapsulation efficiency of Dtx encapsulated FA‐AuNFs was achieved 96 % evident from the elemental mapping, XRD and SAED pattern analysis. The drug release profile exhibited prolonged drug release kinetics at 72 h. The apoptotic quantification and binding affinity (IC 50 ) of the FA capped FA‐AuNFs (FA‐AuNPs‐Dtx) were evaluated for the in‐vitro cytotoxicity and fluorescent staining analysis against prostate cancer cell line (PC3). The synthesized multifunctional nanoformulations could be comprehensively used for simultaneous imaging and therapeutic applications.