Self‐assembly of methoxy poly(ethylene glycol)‐cholesterol micelles for controlled quercetin delivery with toxicity test in Danio rerio model

Quercetin has been studied extensively with drug delivery systems due to the drug's needs to improve in solubility, but usually the systems are complicated, evading the practical aspects and potential applications. This problem is expected to be solved using the simplistic micelles, in combination with the materials mPEG and cholesterol to gain advantages from the nano‐size, while increasing its overall stability and drug releasing. In this study PEGylated‐cholesterol micelles were prepared by co‐solvent method in 4 different drug‐polymer ratios, which were then characterized by physical–chemical, in vitro analyses and emphasized on the in vivo cytotoxicity test by H&E staining histological assay on Danio rerio model. The results show promising features of nano‐micelles as a passive drug delivery system in size, CMC value, and prolonged drug releasing profile. Compared to free QCT, the micelles‐loaded system exhibited significantly higher toxicity in vitro, which were also demonstrated in in vivo models, where the drug‐loaded micellar systems posed mild tissue changes, while blank micelles and free quercetin were almost harmless to the animals. The results had concluded that effective delivering of micellar system does not require advanced material‐composition, rather a throughout understanding of the interactions of nano‐properties and the materials with bio‐systems. Quercetin drugs were incorporated in the hydrophobic inner‐section of micellar particles, and the weight ratio between these were examined to optimize the drug‐loading capacity. The micellar nanoparticles were then subject to various analytical experiments, which provide sufficient data about “drug‐delivering” ability of mPEG‐Cholesterol as materials for micelles’ formulations. With the increase in requirements for in vivo tests recently and the limited properties of rodent and mammal models, we have developed a testing protocol using zebrafish (Danio rerio) models to examine in vivo the anti‐cancer drug’ effect on bodily systems.