Designing chitosan nanoparticles embedded into graphene oxide as a drug delivery system

We investigated a novel drug delivery system comprising nanoparticles based on chitosan/graphene oxide (GO)/folic acid for targeted delivery of chemotherapeutic drugs. In this research, GO is accompanied with chitosan as natural cationic polysaccharide to increase compatibility. First, GO was synthesized, then chitosan was grafted to it by chemical interaction, and then chitosan nanoparticle and GO hybrid nanocomposite were synthesized. The resulting nanocarrier is analyzed via different characterization methods. FTIR and XRD results were used to show the chemical and structural information before and after modification of GO nanocarrier. FESEM image of GO observed showed the nanoparticle was successfully attached on the surface of GO sheets. The thermal decomposition obtained showed that the thermal stability has been extended by the grafted Chitosan chains to GO; also, the highest loading capacity with folic acid was related to graphene oxide–chitosan nanoparticle nanocomposite. Then, folic acid was loaded on nanocarrier and its release was assessed. Results of this research show the combination of chitosan and GO by chemical interaction leading to creating holes, which increase loading to 99.97% and release to 94% for 72 h.