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Cited by 4Curcumin's Biomedical ApplicationsNanoparticle-Based Drug DeliveryDrug Solubulity and Delivery Systems

Comparative in vitro cytotoxicity of free curcumin and a liposomal curcumin formulation on various human cancer cell lines

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Ali, Said A., Helmy, Hagar I., Gaber, Mohamed H.·2026·Scientific Reports
DOI 10.1038/s41598-026-36607-xPMC PMC12905290
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Abstract

Phospholipids derived from plants are promising for drug delivery applications. This study aimed to develop liposomes from cost-effective, plant-derived soy lecithin to enhance the cytotoxicity of curcumin (CUR) against a panel of human cancer cells. The optimized curcumin-loaded liposomes (CUR-Liposomes) were characterized and exhibited a nanoscale size of 105.7 nm, and a high negative zeta potential of -49.9 mV. The key finding from the in vitro cytotoxicity assay was that CUR-liposomes demonstrated significantly enhanced anticancer activity compared to free CUR, as evidenced by lower half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) values across all tested cancer cell lines, including multidrug-resistant MCF-7 breast adenocarcinoma (MCF-7/ADR), colon (Caco-2), lung (A549), prostate (PC3), and pancreatic (PANC-1) cancer cells. Notably, this enhanced cytotoxicity was not observed in normal Vero cells, suggesting a favorable selectivity profile. These findings demonstrate that liposomal encapsulation using plant-derived lipids is a viable strategy to improve the therapeutic efficacy and potential selectivity of CUR for cancer treatment.

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  • The MTT assay assesses mitochondrial activity to indicate cell viability.

    “Cytotoxic potential of the extracts was evaluated using the MTT assay, which measures mitochondrial activity as an indicator of cell viability (Abolhasanzadeh et al., 2024;Adeniyi-Akee et al., 2025;Ali et al., 2026;Zohmachhuana et al., 2022).”

    From PHYTOCHEMICAL CHARACTERIZATION AND EVALUATION OF ANTIOXIDANT, ANTIMICROBIAL, ANTI-INFLAMMATORY, AND CYTOTOXIC ACTIVITIES OF SEQUENTIAL EXTRACTS FROM RIPE BANANA (MUSA PARADISIACA L.) PEEL (2026) · cites this paper as Ali et al., 2026

    The Materials and methods section (In vitro cell line study; page unavailable) describes MTT being metabolized to formazan and its optical density being used as an indicator of cell number. This supports the assay’s use to assess viable cells, but the paper does not specify that the activity measured is mitochondrial. (LLM, conf=0.86)

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Research works printed but not linked: 25

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Ali, S. A., Helmy, H. I., & Gaber, M. H.
Affiliations
Cairo University (EG)
Corresponding author
Ali, Said A.
ORCID
Venue
Scientific Reports
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Published
2026-02-11
Volume
16
Issue
1
Pages
6346-6346
ISSN
2045-2322 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1038/s41598-026-36607-x
PMC
PMC12905290
OpenAlex
W7128589536
Cited by
4
References
0
Citations by year
2026: 4
FWCI
8.87
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Scientific Reports (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
Cairo University
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Medicine › Curcumin's Biomedical Applications
  • Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Biomaterials › Nanoparticle-Based Drug Delivery
  • Life Sciences › Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics › Pharmaceutical Science › Drug Solubulity and Delivery Systems
Keywords
curcumin, liposomal drug delivery, soy lecithin, anticancer activity, cytotoxicity, multidrug resistance, MCF-7 breast cancer, A549 lung cancer, liposome characterization, drug selectivity
MeSH terms
Animals, Antineoplastic Agents, Cell Survival, Chlorocebus aethiops, Curcumin, Humans, Liposomes, Neoplasms, Vero Cells, Drug Delivery Systems, Cell Line, Tumor, MCF-7 Cells

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