Antiproliferative Activity of PEG-PEI-SWCNTs against AMJ13 Breast Cancer Cells

Abstract

Single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) involving polyethylene glycol (PEG) and polyethyleneimine (PEI), which contain amines, were produced and analyzed using X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV–vis spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy (RS), and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) for the spectral and structural analyses of PEG-PEI-SWCNTs. PEG-PEI-SWCNTs demonstrated peaks using UV–vis spectroscopy at 300.98 nm, have a broad peak at 2θ = 23.51, linked to 002 with d-spacing (3.7816), and have crystalline sizes of 8.48 nm. In PEG-PEI-SWCNTs, TEM images demonstrated the accumulation of SWCNTs with PEG-PEI due to an increased main grain size with functionalization to 80.68 nm. The D and G bands in PEG-PEI-SWCNTs moved to 1,292 and 1,586 cm−1, respectively. SWCNTs are observed as a bundle of inhomogeneous, long-curved accumulates containing multitudes of tubes. The PEG-PEI-SWCNTs have a tubular structure that demonstrates particles scattered alongside the carbon nanotube sidewalls, which indicate that PEG and PEI are conjugated to the SWCNTs. Cytotoxicity evaluation of PEG-PEI-SWCNTs (6.25–100 µg/mL) in the breast cancer AMJ13 cell line was conducted for 24 and 72 hr, and the results showed enhanced toxicity to the tumor cells and decreased cytotoxicity against rhabdomyosarcoma (RD) normal cells.