Anticancer drug delivery with transferrin targeted polymeric chitosan vesicles.

Purpose: The study reports the initial biological evaluation of targeted polymeric glycol chitosan vesicles as carrier systems for doxorubicin (Dox).
Methods: Transferrin (Tf) was covalently bound to the Dox-loaded palmitoylated glycol chitosan (GCP) vesicles using dimethylsuberimidate (DMSI). For comparison, glucose targeted niosomes were prepared using N-palmitoyl glucosamine. Biological properties were studied using confocal microscopy, flow cytometry, and cytotoxicity assays as well as a mouse xenograft model.
Results: Tf vesicles were taken up rapidly with a plateau after 1-2 h and Dox reached the nucleus after 60-90 min. Uptake was not increased with the use of glucose ligands, but higher uptake and increased cytotoxicity were observed for Tf targeted as compared to GCP Dox alone. In the drug-resistant A2780AD cells and in A431 cells, the relative increase in activity was significantly higher for the Tf-GCP vesicles than would have been expected from the uptake studies. All vesicle formulations had a superior in vivo safety profile compared to the free drug.
Conclusions: The in vitro advantage of targeted Tf vesicles did not translate into a therapeutic advantage in vivo. All vesicles reduced tumor size on day 2 but were overall less active than the free drug.