Cytotoxicity Effect Assessment of Theophylline Loaded with Collagen Nanoparticles

The selective drug delivery of asthma treatment is more challenging. Mullet fish contain several types of medically essential substances, such as collagen, which can be an effective and straightforward method of drug delivery. The present study aimed at extracting collagen from mullet fish scales and forming collagen nanoparticles using ethanol (non-solvent for collagen) to provide a desolvation process and loading of theophylline with the nanoprecipitation method collagen nanoparticles in the presence of glutaraldehyde as a crosslinker. The cytotoxicity effect of theophylline loaded with collagen nanoparticles compared to collagen nanoparticles and free theophylline was evaluated using MTT assay on NHSF cell line at the first dose of 3 mM theophylline with double fold serial dilutions. Our research demonstrated the efficacy of theophylline loading in collagen nanoparticles, and we were assured of the result by energy dispersive X-ray mapping (EDX) and optical microscopy. The order of increase in cytotoxicity was collagen nanoparticles < theophylline loaded with collagen nanoparticles < theophylline for all concentrations. These findings imply that collagen nanoparticles are an effective and safe method to use as a drug delivery system.