Inclusion complexes of anhydrolycorine with cyclodextrins: preparation, characterization, and anticancer activity

This article describes the preparation of a series of inclusion complexes of anhydrolycorine with three cyclodextrins (CDs), namely β-CD, γ-CD, and 2-hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin (HP-β-CD), and their successful characterization through UV, TG, DSC, XRD, SEM, 1H NMR, and 2D NMR spectroscopies. The results demonstrated that the water solubility of anhydrolycorine increased notably by about 23–42 times after the inclusion complexation with these CDs. Furthermore, preliminary in vitro cytotoxicity experiments on human colon cancer cell lines HT-29, SW480, HCT116, and DLD-1 were also performed, and the complexes showed remarkable anticancer activity against HT-29, SW480, and HCT116. These results suggested that the inclusion complexes would be potentially useful for applications for human colon cancer chemotherapy.