Synthesis, characterization and comparative anticancer potential of phytosynthesized mono and bimetallic nanoparticles using Moringa oleifera aqueous leaf extract.

In this article we bring up facile one-step phytosynthesis of Silver (Ag), Gold (Au) and Ag/Au bimetallic nanoparticles by reduction of Silver nitrate and Tetrachloroauric acid solution, using aqueous leaf extract of Moringa oleifera . Physical characterization was done using different techniques including UV-Visible spectroscopy, FT-IR Spectroscopic Analysis, DLS, Zeta Potential, XRD, TEM and EDAX. These nanoparticles were evaluated for their cytotoxicity against human hepatocellular carcinoma cells (HepG2) and breast cancer cell line (MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7). Our data suggest these phytosynthesized nanoparticles showed a dose-dependent cytotoxic effect on all the cancer cell lines. However, AuNPs is seen to have higher cytotoxic potential with IC 50 value in the range of  9.20-21.46µg/ml  compared to that of Bimetallic NPs (Ag-Au NPs) with IC 50 value of 37.22-49.94µg/ml. Whereas, Silver NPs (AgNPs) didn’t show cytotoxic activity upto 60µg/ml in all the three cell lines for 24hrs. Hence, this study supports the effectiveness of phytosynthesized AuNPs for the development of anticancer agents.