Pavithra Vivekanand，生物学副教授金纳米颗粒多年来一直是科学研究的主题, 尤其是它们在癌症治疗中的应用. 教师 and students in the departments of 生物学 and 化学 joined together to take a novel approach to their own research when they created the multiuse nanoparticles out of natural sources such as lemongrass and green tea to test their effectiveness against cervical and melanoma cancer cells.
“Gold nanoparticles are traditionally synthesized using commercially available chemical compounds,” Pavithra Vivekanand，副教授 生物学. “The advantage of using natural sources is that they are more environmentally friendly and hopefully less toxic to all cells. What we found in the course of our research is that the gold nanoparticles synthesized from green sources were more potent against the cancer cells than chemically synthesized nanoparticles.”
来制造金纳米颗粒, 22岁的生物学专业学生布鲁克·韦弗将柠檬草煮成一种提取物. The extract was then combined with gold chloride to form the “green” nanoparticle. 制作提取物并不像听起来那么容易.
“It took my predecessor and me many trials using different store brands of lemongrass as well as trying different procedures to make sure the extract was as pure as possible,韦弗说. “如果玻璃器皿没有清洗干净，或者萃取物没有过滤, 纳米颗粒通常会变色.”
斯瓦娜·巴苏，化学教授兼主席在掌握了这个过程后的指导下 Swarna巴苏，香港大学教授 化学, Weaver exposed cervical and melanoma cancer cells to the green-sourced nanoparticles and traditional nanoparticles for 48 hours, after which Weaver found that the green synthesized nanoparticles were “much more potent in killing the cancer cells,”她说。.
The next step was to determine “how” the cells were dying — because there is a good way and a bad way to die, Vivekanand解释. 他们的研究确定癌细胞是通过细胞凋亡而死亡的, 这是细胞有序死亡的过程，也是维韦坎南德所希望的. 反之则称为坏死, 在这种情况下，垂死细胞的内容物会溢出并引起炎症.
“Many of the chemicals and additives used in the traditional synthesis of gold nanoparticles can be toxic to humans. This is why it is important to find ways to create these nanoparticles using natural components,维韦卡南德说. “That our research has found these natural compounds to be even more potent against cancer cells than traditional methods is very exciting and underscores the importance of pursuing basic research to get insights that may be used to develop novel cancer treatments.”
Weaver is looking forward to contributing her data to the existing scientific body of knowledge.
“Much of the available research surrounding these green nanoparticles focuses on characterizing their size, 形状和光吸收. There are very few studies that examine the possible cytotoxic effects these nanoparticles present to various cancer cell lines,韦弗说. “I’m very excited to publish my own findings to the scientific community that corroborates the existing studies.”
用蜂蜜抑制炎症
在实验室的其他地方， 生物医学科学 major John Duncan ’23 conducted similar research to determine if gold nanoparticles synthesized from honey were effective in changing how immune cells respond to inflammation.
“It has been determined that varieties of gold nanoparticles inhibit the proinflammatory response of macrophages, 可以对抗细菌, 这可以由细菌脂多糖引发, 细菌细胞的结构成分是什么,邓肯说. 因为蜂蜜具有抗炎和抗氧化的特性, we wanted to used honey-synthesized gold nanoparticles to test their effects on LPS-activated macrophages.”
In addition to testing commercially produced honey purchased at a local grocery store, 邓肯还使用了从萨斯奎汉娜自己的蜂箱中收集的蜂蜜 环境教育与研究中心 ——秋天采深色的蜂蜜，春天采浅色的蜂蜜.
Preliminary results suggest that honey-synthesized gold nanoparticles inhibit a cell’s inflammatory response.
“有趣的是, 这种反应似乎是针对白细胞介素-6的, 一种帮助调节免疫反应的蛋白质,邓肯说. “我们的初步发现非常令人鼓舞. Given that high levels of proinflammatory proteins are associated with numerous chronic inflammatory diseases, finding a relatively novel way to suppress these proteins may have therapeutic implications.”
After graduating from Susquehanna in December, Weaver plans to attend dental school in the future. Duncan is in the process of applying to doctoral programs in the 生物医学科学 and integrated life sciences.
