Preparation and characterization of polyglycerol-RGD peptide functionalized molybdenum oxide nanocomposite for doxorubicin delivery

The aim of this study is to develop a novel molybdenum oxide nanocomposite with good dispersion and targeting tumor cells and investigate their DOX delivery performance. Briefly, molybdenum oxide (MoO x ) nanocomposite prepared by hydrothermal method were grafted with polyglycerol (MoO x -PG), followed by stepwise organic coupling with RGD peptide (MoO x -PG-RGD), and finally loaded with DOX. The physicochemical properties of MoO x -PG-RGD nanocomplexes were characterized by FTIR, SEM, XPS and TGA. The results showed that the grafted PG layer largely enhanced the dispersibility and biocompatibility of MoO x nanocomposite in physiological media. The obtained MoO x -PG-RGD/DOX exhibited drug-loading efficiency of 18.67 %. Drug release experiments indicated that MoO x -PG-RGD/DOX exhibited a faster release rate under acidic conditions in tumors. In addition, MTT cytotoxicity assay and cell uptake experiments indicated that MoO x -PG-RGD/DOX efficiently delivered DOX into targeted cells by integrin α v β 3 receptor-mediated endocytosis, which leading to an enhanced therapeutic efficacy of DOX. These results suggested that MoO x -PG-RGD, as a novel anticancer drug delivery vector, had great potential for application in tumor therapy.