Synthesizing and Characterizing Functionalized Short Multiwall Carbon Nanotubes with Folate, Magnetite and Polyethylene Glycol as Multi- targeted Nanocarrier of Anti-cancer Drugs

Multifunctional nanomaterials showed great advantages in drug delivery. Folic acid (FA) binding protein, a glycosyl phosphatidyl inositol anchored cell surface receptor for folate, is overexpressed in several human tumors, whereas it is highly restricted in normal tissues. Therefore, in this study, FA, polyethylene glycol (PEG), and Fe3O4 nanoparticles multifunctionalized short multiwall carbon nanotubes (PEG-FA-SMWCNT@Fe3O4) were synthesized by conjugating folate, PEG, and magnetite nanoparticles with carboxylated multiwall carbon nanotubes. The prepared c-SMWCNT@Fe3O4 was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) in order to investigate crystal and magnetic properties, respectively. The images obtained by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) showed that the magnetite nanoparticles were attached to the surfaces of carbon nanotubes and SMWCNT@Fe3O4 was formed. Investigation of functional groups using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra indicated that PEG-FA was successfully linked to SMWCNT@Fe3O4.