pH responsive mesoporous silica as a carrier for controlling doxorubicin hydrochloride delivery

A stimuli-responsive drug carrier (MSNs@P(AA-co-DMAEMA)) with a core-shell structure was constructed using double-bond modified mesoporous silica nanoparticles as a matrix and acrylic acid (AA) and dimethylaminoethyl methacrylate (DMAEMA) as pH-responsive monomers. The structure and properties of the (MSNs@P(AA-co-DMAEMA)) were analyzed by FTIR, TGA, SEM, TEM, XRD, XPS and BET. Adriamycin hydrochloride (DOX) was used as a drug model to investigate the adsorption and release ability of the (MSNs@P(AA-co-DMAEMA)). The adsorption performance tests showed that the drug loading and encapsulation rates were 7.63% and 80.98% at 25 °C, respectively. The drug release results in vitro showed that the cumulative drug release rate of the carrier reached 45.22% at pH 5.5 environment, which was 2.16 times higher than that at pH 7.4, with obvious pH responsiveness. The hemolysis assay demonstrated that the carrier has good biocompatibility.