Simple and fast design of folic acid-based carbon dots as theranostic agent and its drug release aspect

The usage of folic acid as source carbon dots is an excellent way to promote its efficient and specific target to folate receptor expressed cells, even the most methods serve on the complicated procedure. This research was conducted by synthesizing folic acid-based carbon dots (FACDs) through furnace and microwave-assisted methods to offer a simple and effective process. Thermal treatment belongs to the methods that allow both dehydration and carbonization of folic acid to produce graphene oxide-like structure carbon dots. The successful synthesis process was convinced with some characterization data, like diameter size of FACDs was below than 6 nm sizes and photoluminescence at emission 481 nm. Further FTIR, Raman, and XPS analysis demonstrated potency formation of graphene oxide-like structure on CDs within a non-polar feature. In vitro assessment through CCK-8, flow cytometry, and confocal microscopy revealed that all of the prepared FACDs perform low-toxicity and work well on HeLa cancer staining by folate receptor-mediated endocytosis into the cell cytoplasm. On the good agreement with diagnostic capability on the cell, FACDs produced by both methods also perform excellent therapeutic capability on doxorubicin delivery with its kinetical release follow the Korsmeyer-Peppas model. All the findings confirm that the methods were excellent ways to perform good FACDs as theranostic agents for biological applications. [Display omitted] •Synthesis of CDs from folic acid as Doxorubicin Delivery through simple steps.•Comparison FACDs properties prepared from furnace and microwave assisted methods.•The release of Doxorubicin follows Korsmeyer-Peppas kinetics model and accelerate on acid condition.•All FACDS perform low cytotoxicity and can work on delivering the drug well.