Elsevier

Materials Letters

Volume 210, 1 January 2018, Pages 26-30
Materials Letters

Featured Letter
Flavonoids mediated ‘Green’ nanomaterials: A novel nanomedicine system to treat various diseases – Current trends and future perspective

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matlet.2017.08.078Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Flavanoids mediated ‘Green’ nanomaterials are used to treat various diseases.

  • It has dual function as nano-carrier and nano-drug in biomedical applications.

  • Hydroxyl and carbonyl groups of flavonoids are involved in nanomaterial formation.

  • Flavanoids-mediated nanomaterial might be a hot research topic in upcoming days.

Abstract

Nanomedicine utilizes biocompatible nanomaterials for therapeutic purposes to treat various diseases. Flavonoids present in the plant materials act as both reducing and electrostatic stabilizing agents for the ‘Green’ synthesis of metal nanomaterials. Further, these nanomaterials are effectively used to treat various cancer cells and pathogenic microbes. The experimental approach for flavonoids-mediated nanomaterial (FMN) synthesis is simple, rapid, cost-effective and reproducible. However, the detailed reports on synthesis, mechanism, and in vivo application of FMN are very limited in literatures. Thus, this focused review will definitely help researchers who are working on biocompatible nanomaterial synthesis and application in biomedical sector. Further, this is the first review to discuss the significance, mechanisms, and future trends of FMN. The FMN and their dual function as both nano-carrier and nano-drug in various biomedical sectors might be a hot research topic in upcoming days.

Introduction

Metal nanomaterials are known to have immense applications in the field of agriculture, energy, environment, and medicine [1]. Different kinds of physical, chemical, and biological methods have been reported for the synthesis of metal nanomaterials [2], [3], [4], [5], [6]. Metal nanomaterials are highly biocompatible and possess various pharmacological activities. Thus, biosynthesis and characterization of metal nanomaterials are in limelight till date [7]. Interestingly, plant based ‘Green’ synthesis of nanomaterials has drawn great attention due to its cost-effective, eco-friendly, non-pathogenic, rapid, and also efficiency in the treatment process. In addition, “Green” synthesis provides a single step technique as well as trouble-free to scale up for large synthesis.

Section snippets

Plant based metal nanomaterials

Since ancient times, plants have been used as natural remedies for curing many physiological disorders in traditional eastern medicine, particularly Indian and Chinese. The ‘Green’ synthesis of copper (Cu), gold (Au), nickel (Ni), platinum (Pt), titanium (Ti), selenium (Se), silver (Ag), and zinc nanoparticles (ZiNPs) using plant resources had been previously reported in literatures [8]. The plant based metal nanoparticles (MNPs) showed excellent antimicrobial, anticancer, antidiabetic,

Pharmacological importance of flavonoids

Flavonoids, a large class of secondary plant metabolites, are utilized for human health care due to their biological and pharmacological activities [16]. They share a common carbon skeleton of two benzene rings joined by a 3-carbon bridge (C6-C3-C6), as shown in Fig. 1. The subclasses of flavonoids mentioned are anthocyanidins, flavonols, flavones, flavanones, and isoflavones [17]. Flavonoids are used to treat many pathological conditions including Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, cardiovascular

FMN and their biomedical efficacy

Table 1 illustrates the detail of flavonoids involved in the MNPs synthesis and their biomedical efficacy. Recently, our group found the total flavonoids present in the Alternanthera tenella and Coriandrum sativum leaf extracts majorly involved in AgNPs synthesis; and showed antiacne, antidandruff, and antibreast cancer efficacy against Propionibacterium acnes, Malassezia furfur, and human breast adenocarcinoma cells, respectively [5], [15]. Zuas et al. [21] reported that the water soluble

Mechanism of nanomaterial formation by flavonoids

Few studies have proposed the possible mechanism for flavonoids interaction with metal ions to nanomaterial formation (Table 1). According to Raghavan et al. [34], the hydroxyl groups present in the B and C rings of kaempferol may participate in the AuNPs formation. Further, the A ring of kaempferol coated on the surface of AuNPs may be responsible for the radical scavenging activity. Nazeruddin et al. [44] reported the formation of enol form of the luteolin which freely liberates reactive

Dual function of FMN to treat various diseases

As mentioned above, flavonoids find a wide range of applications. However, flavonoids impede their bioactivity in vivo applications, due to their low absorption, poor stability, insolubility, passive diffusion, and active efflux in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract [47]. Interestingly, novel drug delivery system using nanomaterials with a broad spectrum of applications offer a new therapeutic base for scientific integration and innovation. Recent literatures proved that metal based nanomaterials

Conclusions and future perspective

Recently, there is a surge and focus of activity on preparation and characterization of flavonoids based nanomaterials in various capacities using the ‘Green’ synthesis. Detailed research is warranted on mechanistic evaluation of the flavonoid-metal-complexes in solution and in vivo. Modern research is now focused on developing single molecule based nano-conjugates and some of these formulations have promising potential in nanomedicine. Overall it appears that even though there has been

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful for the financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21273081, 21673085, 61405062, and 61675071), the Guangdong Provincial Department of Science and Technology (2013B051000074), the Pearl River Nova Program of Guangzhou (201710010010), Joint International Research Laboratory of Optical Information, and the Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Devices and Systems of Ministry of Education and Guangdong Province (Shenzhen University).

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