Design, preparation, and in vitro characterizations of chitosan-loaded nanostructured lipid carriers: a promising drug delivery system

The remarkable increase of neurodegenerative diseases has become a serious public health problem. Considering the lack of effective treatments to address these diseases and the difficulties in accessing the brain due to the blood-brain barrier, to attain a successful strategy to improve drug delivery to the brain, the administration route becomes a point of interest. In this emergence, the present investigation is designed to develop the chitosan-coated peptide-loaded nano-lipid carrier (CSPepNLC) and characterized by various physico-chemical methods such as laser light scattering for particle size and size distribution, zeta-potential, scanning electron microscope (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), loading, and association efficiency and peptide release rate. The stability of CSPepNLC is screened in plasma, erythrocytes, and genotoxicity in pUC18. In addition, we examined the hatching rate, heart rate, survival rate, mortality rate, deformities, and apoptosis and embryo toxicity in Danio rerio model. Initially, NLC-S1, S2, S3, and S4 and nano-lipid carriers are formulated, and NLC-S4 is selected for the CSPepNLC formulation. CSPepNLC exhibited a particle size of 113.33 nm with PDI 0.301 and zeta potential + 28.18 mV. The association, loading efficiency, and release rate of CSPepNLC were observed to be 94.41 +/- 0.943%, 11.54 +/- 0.572%, and 57% at 30 h. Formulated CSPepNLC was spherical in shape whose size ranges 110-120 nm. Finally, FTIR results confirmed the formation and stability of CSPepNLC. The CSPepNLC exhibited 85% stability at 150 min when incubated with plasma; miniscule hemolysis and absence of hemagglutination are noticed after incubation with erythrocytes. The CSPepNLC revealed the absence of genotoxicity in the pUC18 plasmid DNA nicking assay. The embryo toxicity of CSPepNLC in zebrafish is observed in a time- and dose-dependent manner. Our proposed results concluded that CSPepNLC is observed to be nontoxic at lower concentrations (12.5-100 mu g/ml). In specifically, 200 mu g/ml of CSPepNLC causes slight zebrafish embryo deformities while screening. Finally, although these results seem promising, further modifications in the CSPepNLC formulation are defensible to enhance the percentage of particles reaching the brain after their administration. This desirable drug carrier system demonstrates advantages such as good biocompatibility, low toxicity, drug release modulation, and the possibility of established mass production. The emergence of nanomaterial research is an important and new prospect to develop unique techniques widely used against several pharmaceutical applications. In this study, the obtained results proved that biogenic nanomaterial are great promising biological activity for a developing sustainable ecosystem.