Preparation and In Vitro Cytotoxicity Assessments of Spherical Silica-Encapsulated Liposome Particles for Highly Efficient Drug Carriers.

This work reports the formation of spherical solid silica-encapsulated liposome particles (SLPs) as functions of the concentration of silica precursor, reaction time, temperature, and volume ratios of solvent, respectively. The solid SLPs are more robust and have better drug-loading-efficiency liquid liposomes in carrier formulations. The liquid-state liposomes are hard to handle and have a lower drug-loading efficiency because they are fragile to external stimuli and have narrow hydrophobic phospholipid bilayers. The SLPs were obtained by silicification with tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) in the hydrophilic region of phospholipid bilayers by a sol-gel process. These SLPs were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), focused ion beam (FIB)-SEM, confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), ζ-potential, X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, and UV-vis spectroscopy. The obtained SLPs were spherical with an average size of 2-3 μm. The hydrophilic region of the SLP phospholipid bilayers was confirmed using CLSM with green fluorescent fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) labeling and FIB-SEM. Furthermore, the drug-loading capacity and in vitro cytotoxicity assessments were performed using several drug compounds and L929 cells. The drug-loading capacity of the SLPs was >95%, and in particular, the hydrophobic drug-loading capacity was 2.3 times higher than that of general liposomes. Moreover, the result of an in vitro cytotoxicity assessment of the SLPs was good, about 99% of cell viability.