abstract
Acanthamoeba, a genus that contains at least 24 species of free-living protozoa, is ubiquitous in nature. Successful treatment of Acanthamoeba infections is always very difficult and not always effective. More effective drugs must be developed, and medicinal plants may have a pivotal part in the future of drug discovery. Our research focused on investigating the in vitro anti- acanthamoebic potential of Leea indica and its constituent gallic acid in different concentrations. Water and butanol fractions exhibited significant amoebicidal activity against trophozoites and cysts. Gallic acid (100 mu g/mL) revealed 83% inhibition of trophozoites and 69% inhibition of cysts. The butanol fraction induced apoptosis in trophozoites, which was observed using tunnel assay. The cytotoxicity of the fractions and gallic acid was investigated against MRC-5 and no adverse effects were observed. Gallic acid was successfully loaded within poly (D,L-lactide-co-glycolide) (PLGA) nanoparticles with 82.86% encapsulation efficiency, while gallic acid showed 98.24% in vitro release at 48hours. Moreover, the gallic acid encapsulated in the PLGA nanoparticles exhibited 90% inhibition against trophozoites. In addition, gallic acid encapsulated nanoparticles showed reduced cytotoxicity towards MRC-5 compared to gallic acid, which evidenced that natural product nanoencapsulation in polymeric nanoparticles could play an important role in the delivery of natural products.
keywords
IN-VITRO; POLYHEXAMETHYLENE BIGUANIDE; CHITOSAN NANOPARTICLES; KERATITIS; ANTIOXIDANT; DELIVERY; NANOTECHNOLOGY
subject category
Science & Technology - Other Topics
authors
Mahboob, T; Nawaz, M; Pereira, MD; Tian-Chye, T; Samudi, C; Sekaran, SD; Wiart, C; Nissapatorn, V
our authors
Maria de Lourdes Gomes Pereira
Associate Professor with Aggregationacknowledgements
Muhammad Nawaz is thankful to Deanship of Scientific Research (DSR), Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, for financial support through project no. 2016-093 IRMC. This research was supported by a student grant from University of Malaya (PG088-2015A), FRGS/1/2018/WAB07/UNIM/02/1, The project CICECO-Aveiro Institute of Materials, FCT Ref. UID/CTM/50011/2019, financed by national funds through the FCT/ MCTES, and The project entitled Medicinal underexploited Thai native plants against Acanthamoeba, Leishmania donovani, and Plasmodium falciparum - Toward South East Asia collaboration initiative under The Royal Patronage of Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn (Grant No. 040226).