Nanocomposites and nanomaterials

Double and triple nanocompositions in the system: hydrophilic polymer/inorganic carrier – silver nanoparticles – eumelanin
Zheltonozhskaya Т.B.1, Permyakova N.М.1, Beregova T.V.2, 
Beregoviy S.M.2, Kondratiuk T.O.2, Klepko V.V.1, Klymchuk D.О.3
1 Department of Polymer Physics, Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry of the NAS of Ukraine. 48 Kharkivske Shosse, Kyiv-02160, Ukraine. 
E-mail: zheltonozhskaya@ukr.net 
2 ESC “Institute of Biology and Medicine”, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, 64/13 Volodimirska St., Kyiv-01601, Ukraine.
3 M.G. Kholodny Institute of Botany of the NAS of Ukraine, 2 Tereshchenkovska St., Kyiv-01601, Ukraine.

The creation of hydrophilic nanocarriers for the delivery of poorly soluble and toxic drugs and the development of methods for monitoring the rate and direction of drug distribution in living organisms are important tasks of modern biomedicine. The latter problem has so far been solved by the introduction into the carrier or drug by covalent binding or physical encapsulation of various luminescent compounds: organic substances or metal salts/oxides. However, an equally promising way can be the production of nanoparticles of zero-valent metals in carriers or in drugs themselves, which have plasmon resonance bands in the UV-Vis spectra and whose integral intensity is proportional to the concentration of nanoparticles. This report discusses an attempt to create effective nanocarriers for the natural sparingly soluble anticancer drug eumelanin (EMel) with a possible simple control of its pharmacokinetics in living organisms using silver and gold nanoparticles.
A hydrophilic polymer/inorganic hybrid (PIH) containing silica nanoparticles and grafted polyacrylamide chains was synthesized, purified, well characterized, and used as nanocarrier for both silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) and EMel preparation in an aqueous medium. The molecular parameters, structure and behavior of individual PIH and EMel samples, as well as the state of their double and ternary compositions with in situ formed AgNPs are presented based on the data of elemental analysis, viscometry, DTGA, 1H NMR, FTIR and UV-Vis spectroscopy, potentiometric titration, dialysis, and TEM. Also shown are the results of biological experiments conducted in the context of the use of AgNPs to control the distribution of EMel and PIH in individual organs of rats. The prospects for the further development of this approach are discussed.