The Role of Gold Nanoparticles in Sonosensitization of Human Cervical Carcinoma Cell Line under Ultrasound Irradiation: An In Vitro Study

Abstract

Purpose: The objective of this investigation was to evaluate the combined effects of ultrasound irradiation as a non-invasive and non-ionizing radiation with gold nanoparticles as ultrasound sensitizers on the HeLa cells. Materials and Methods: First, Gold nanoparticles (GNPs) were prepared, and the characterizations of nanoparticles were analyzed using TEM and UV-vis. Different concentrations of nanoparticles (0.2, 1, 5, 25 and 50 mu g/ml) were used. Then, cytotoxicity of the GNPs was studied on HeLa cells, and finally concentrations of 0.2, 1 and 5 mu g/mL were chosen for supplementary studies. The effects of nanoparticles and ultrasound irradiation with different intensities (0.5, 1 and 1.5 W/cm(2)) as well as the combination of ultrasound radiation with various concentrations of nanoparticles on 24, 48 and 72 h post-experiment cells' viability were estimated by MTT and trypan blue assay. Results: Results showed that the sonosensitizing effect of nanoparticles mainly depended on the intensity of ultrasound waves and the concentration of GNPs. By increasing the concentration of GNPs and ultrasound intensity, the nanoparticle's effect of sensitizer was also increased. Moreover, as expected, the highest effect was observed at the highest intensities (1.5 W/cm(2)) of ultrasound wave and high concentrations (5 mu g/ml) of GNPs 72 h after exposure to ultrasound irradiation. Conclusions: It is revealed that GNPs can be used as sonosensitizers of HeLa cells to ultrasound irradiation in order to produce an efficient treatment.