Synthesis of Graphene Oxide Shielded Highly Stable Nano Liposomes for Intestinal Delivery of CoQ10

This study aimed to design robust liposomes with the incorporation of graphene oxide for the effective intestinal delivery of CoQ10. Generally, the phospholipid-based liposomes are unable to bear extreme gastrointestinal track environment; as a result, the bursting of liposomes releases most of the drug in the stomach. Herein, we report graphene oxide-shielded lecithin-based nanoliposomes (GOnL) fabricated using wet sonochemical method. The scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), dynamic light scattering (DLS), and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) results showed that GO had been efficiently incorporated into the liposomes. The incorporation of GO into liposomes provided them exceptional flexibility and robustness as the diameter of unloaded GOnL was found as 12.8 nm which was increased up to 42 nm after loading of lipophilic molecule CoQ10 into its lipid bilayer. They also possess excellent encapsulation efficiency of about 97.6%. GOnL showed only 10% release in artificial gastric fluid which confirms that GO in GOnL is preventing nanoliposomes to release drug in acidic medium, hence acting as a shield to preserve maximum drug in the acidic environment. Ninety-five percent of drug was released in artificial intestinal fluid following the sustained release patterns. The efficiency of GOnL nanocarriers was also investigated in enzymatic solutions. The results showed that less than 5% of CoQ10 was degraded in pepsin-containing artificial gastric fluid and trypsin-containing artificial intestinal fluid. The biocompatibility experiments also confirmed that GOnL are nontoxic and biocompatible. These results confirmed that GOnL are a good candidate for intestinal release of drugs and micronutrients and are capable nanocarriers for improving bioavailability of loaded drugs.