Silica-Coated Metal Oxide Nanoparticles: Magnetic and Cytotoxicity Studies

Metal oxide nanoparticles are one of the most important categories of nanomaterials. Increasing use of metal oxide nanoparticles necessitates an improved understanding of their potential impact on human health. We demonstrated that silica (SiO2) coated magnetic transitional metal oxides (alpha-Fe2O3, NiO, Co3O4) nanoparticles were facilely synthesized through wet chemical methods. Structural, morphological and compositional details of these nanoparticles have been investigated. Optical absorption study was also carried out to compare the bare and silica coated metal oxide nanoparticles. Magnetic measurement of these three silica coated metal oxide samples reveals their ferromagnetic behavior. The biocompatibility of nanoparticles is the prerequisite for their applications in biomedicine, but can be misleading due to toxicity of these nanomaterials. Cytotoxicity was evaluated for these materials via Cell culture, MTT (3-(4,5-dimethyl-2-thiazolyl)-2,5-diphenyl-tetrazolium bromide) assay in human normal embryonic kidney cell line (HEK-293) and human breast adenocarcinoma cell line (MCF-7) which shows its non-toxicity towards HEK-293 and the effectiveness of the sample towards the destruction of MCF-7. Measurements of nanoparticles treated cells by morphological assessment assay demonstrate that these nanomaterials exhibit excellent cellular viability. Thus, silica coated magnetic metal oxide nanomaterials appear to be a new roadmap in the search of biocompatible resources for medical applications.