Degradation of doxorubicin to non-toxic metabolites using Fe-Ni bimetallic nanoparticles

•Fe-Ni bimetallic nanoparticles for degradation of doxorubicin (DOX).•Degradation proceeds through chemisorptive, pseudo-multilayer film-diffusion mineralisation.•Degradation mechanism is similar to metabolic degradation pathway for doxorubicin.•Secondary metabolites are non-toxic to cancer and normal cell lines.•Fe-Ni nanoparticles mimics aldo-keto reductase enzyme.

Contamination of water and soil with Pharmaceutical and Personal Care Products (PPCP); although present at very lower concentrations, has raised alarming issues regarding their toxicity to ecosystem. Their mitigation through biological and chemical treatments have been a area of great interest in recent past. One such attempt is made wherein degradation of doxorubicin (DOX); a well known anticancer agent, is explored with Fe-Ni bimetallic nanoparticles (Fe-Ni NP's). These nanoparticles degrade DOX through chemisorptive exothermic pseudo-multilayer film-diffusion mineralisation process as evident from adsorption and intra-particle mechanisms. The degradation mechanism is established from metabolites formed during its degradation by LC-MS analysis. It is observed that chemical degradation route closely resembles with that of metabolic pathway mediated by aldo-keto reductase (AKR); a family of oxido-reductase enzyme involving ROS and iron-sulphur clusters. The toxicity of degraded DOX solution evaluated against two breast cancer cell lines viz. MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231 and a normal cell line HEK-293 revealed that the metabolites are non-toxic in nature. These findings are further corroborated with chemo-informatics studies using Molinspiration Properties Calculator. Formation of oxide layer on the nanoparticle surface evident from XPS analysis that decreases their recycling capacity. Thus, Fe-Ni NP's are exhibiting properties like a functional mimic of AKR that degrade DOX in an eco-friendly manner.

Graphical abstractDegradation of doxorubicin using Fe-Ni NP's generates non-toxic metabolites that are non-carcinogenic in nature.Download high-res image (102KB)Download full-size image