Synthesis of mesoporous SiO2 nanoparticles and toxicity assessment in early life stages of zebrafish

Mesoporous nanoparticles (MNPs) have attracted great interest in the biomedical applications as reliable drug carriers for cancer treatment. They have significant advantages over the traditional drug carriers due to high surface area, controllable pore size, large pore volume, easy adjustment of the inner and outer surfaces, and also, high drug loading capacity. This work has focused on the synthesis of mesoporous silicon dioxide nanoparticles (MNPs) with different pore volumes and their toxicity effects on zebrafish. The structural and morphological analyses of MNPs were carried out through XRD and HRTEM, functional groups have been identified by FTIR and N2 adsorption/desorption isotherm and the pore size distribution was determined by BET analysis. The maximum pore volume of 1.5 cm3/g and a pore size of 8.0 nm, were reported. Survival percentage of zebrafish was reported to be above 85%.