Development and Assessment of Mitoxantrone and 4- Methyl Umbelliferone Nanoemulsions for Chemotherapeutic Potential on MCF-7 Cell Line

Abstract

Every year, millions of new cases of cancer of various forms are identified, resulting in a high mortality rate. For the management of breast cancers, chemotherapeutics such as Mitoxantrone (MTO) and 4-Methyl Umbelliferone(4-MU), show significant cytotoxic effects. The goal of this research was to develop and characterize nanoemulsion of MTO and 4-MU and to further assess the cytotoxic activity of this formulation against MCF-7 cell lines using MTT assay. Aqueous microtitration technique was employed to prepare the nanoemulsion using cinnamaldehyde as an oil phase, Tween-80 as a surfactant, and PEG-400 as a co-surfactant. The developed nanoemulsions were characterized for droplet size, PDI, %transmittance, drug content, surface morphology, and in vitro release. Photomicrograph of developed NE showed spherical droplets with a mean diameter of 113.2±5.3 nm and 123.2±6.17 nm for 4-MU and MTO, respectively, and a PDI was found to be 0.254 and 0.281 for 4-MU and MTO respectively. Approximately 78.53±4.61 % of 4-MU were released under sink conditions after 8 hours in a dissolution study. MTO-NE and 4-MU-NE had a longer drug release profile in the in-vitro method when compared to standard drug solutions. The cytotoxic effect of 4-MU and 4-MU-NE was assessed on the MCF-7 cell line by MTT assay and exhibited IC50s of 3.868 mM and 1.885 Mm against MCF-7, respectively. MTO and MTO-NE had IC50s of 10.51μM and 5.027 μM against MCF-7, respectively. The results of this study show the great potential of the prepared nanoemulsions for breast cancer; hence it can be concluded that developed NEs of chemotherapeutics lead the way forward for further in-vivo research.