Evaluation of magnetic nanoparticles for magnetic fluid hyperthermia.

Background: Magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) generate heat when exposed to an alternating magnetic field. Consequently, MNPs are used for magnetic fluid hyperthermia (MFH) for cancer treatment, and have been shown to increase the efficacy of chemotherapy and/or radiation treatment in clinical trials. A downfall of current MFH treatment is the inability to deliver sufficient heat to the tumor due to: insufficient amounts of MNPs, unequal distribution of MNPs throughout the tumor, or heat loss to the surrounding environment. Objective: In this study, the objective was to identify MNPs with high heating efficiencies quantified by their specific absorption rate (SAR). Methods: A panel of 31 commercially available MNPs were evaluated for SAR in two different AMFs. Additionally, particle properties including iron content, hydrodynamic diameter, core diameter, magnetic diameter, magnetically dead layer thickness, and saturation mass magnetization were investigated. Results: High SAR MNPs were identified. For SAR calculations, the initial slope, corrected slope, and Box-Lucas methods were used and validated using a graphical residual analysis, and the Box-Lucas method was shown to be the most accurate. Other particle properties were identified and examined for correlations with SAR values. Positive correlations of particle properties with SAR were found, including a strong correlation for the magnetically dead layer thickness. Conclusions: This work identified high SAR MNPs for hyperthermia, and provides insight into properties which correlate with SAR which will be valuable for synthesis of next-generation MNPs. SAR calculation methods must be standardized, and this work provides an in-depth analysis of common calculation methods.

Biocompatibility evaluation of porous ceria foams for orthopedic tissue engineering.

Ceria ceramics have the unique ability to protect cells from free radical-induced damage, making them materials of interest for biomedical applications. To expand upon the understanding of the potential of ceria as a biomaterial, porous ceria, fabricated via direct foaming, was investigated to assess its biocompatibility and its ability to scavenge free radicals. A mouse osteoblast (7F2) cell line was cultured with the ceria foams to determine the extent of the foams' toxicity. Toxicity assessments indicate that mouse osteoblasts cultured directly on the ceria scaffold for 72 h did not show a significant (p > 0.05) increase in toxicity, but rather show comparable toxicity to cells cultured on porous 45S5 Bioglass. The in vitro inflammatory response elicited from porous ceria foams was measured as a function of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) secreted from a human monocytic leukemia cell line. Results indicate that the ceria foams do not cause a significant inflammatory response, eliciting a response of 27.1 ± 7.1 pg mL(-1) of TNF-α compared to 36.3 ± 5.8 pg mL(-1) from cells on Bioglass, and 20.1 ± 2.9 pg mL(-1) from untreated cells. Finally, we report cellular toxicity in response to free radicals from tert-butyl hydroperoxide with and without foamed ceria. Our preliminary results show that the foamed ceria is able to decrease the toxic effect of induced oxidative stress. Collectively, this study demonstrates that foamed ceria scaffolds do not activate an inflammatory response, and show potential free radical scavenging ability, thus they have promise as an orthopedic biomaterial.