Comparative study on the performance of monoolein cubic nanoparticles and trimyristin solid lipid nanoparticles as carriers for docetaxel.

Nowadays the application of lipid nanoparticles as carriers for the delivery of anticancer drugs gained great attention in cancer therapy. Solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN) and cubic nanoparticles (cubosomes) are considered as promising carriers in cancer therapy. The comparison of these two lipid nanoparticles as efficient carriers for the anticancer drug docetaxel was our main goal in this study. Both nanoparticles were prepared by the hot melt homogenization technique followed by measurement of particle size, zeta potential, entrapment efficiency and release of docetaxel. An advanced technique has been applied to measure the release of docetaxel from these nanoparticles using small unilamellar vesicles (SUV) as acceptor particles which resemble many compartments in our body. All prepared nanoparticles revealed a neutral zeta potential with particle sizes of about 200 nm. While SUV showed a negative surface charge with a zeta potential of -55 mV, cubosomes showed higher entrapment efficiency and a slower docetaxel release compared to SLN. Additionally, cubosomes improved cytotoxicity as well as the antitumor inhibition of docetaxel compared to SLN and docetaxel solution. Overall, our results showed that incorporation of docetaxel into cubosomes could enhance its and performance compared to docetaxel incorporated into SLN