Novel Liposomal Formulation of Baicalein for the Treatment of Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma: Design, Characterization, and Evaluation

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Pancreatic cancer (PC) is one of the deadliest cancers so there is an urgent need to develop new drugs and therapies to treat it. Liposome-based formulations of naturally-derived bioactive compounds are promising anticancer candidates due to their potential for passive accumulation in tumor tissues, protection against payload degradation, and prevention of non-specific toxicity. We chose the naturally-derived flavonoid baicalein (BAI) due to its promising effect against pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) and encapsulated it into a liposomal bilayer using the passive loading method, with an almost 90% efficiency. We performed a morphological and stability analysis of the obtained BAI liposomal formulation and evaluated its activity on two-dimensional and three-dimensional pancreatic cell models. As the result, we obtained a stable BAI-encapsulated liposomal suspension with a size of 100.9 nm ± 2.7 and homogeneity PDI = 0.124 ± 0.02, suitable for intravenous administration. Furthermore, this formulation showed high cytotoxic activity towards AsPC-1 and BxPC-3 PDAC cell lines (IC50 values ranging from 21 ± 3.6 µM to 27.6 ± 4.1 µM), with limited toxicity towards normal NHDF cells and a lack of hemolytic activity. Based on these results, this new BAI liposomal formulation is an excellent candidate for potential anti-PDAC therapy.

Original languageEnglish
Article number179
JournalPharmaceutics
Volume15
Issue number1
Number of pages24
ISSN1999-4923
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The study was supported by a statutory subsidy from the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education for the Faculty of Biotechnology of the University of Wroclaw. The publication of this article was supported by the Excellence Initiative—Research University program for the University of Wrocław.

    Research areas

  • baicalein, flavonoids, hemolysis, liposomes, nanomedicine, nanotechnology, natural compounds, pancreatic cancer

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