Cytotoxicity assay of plant-mediated synthesized iron oxide nanoparticles using Juglans regia green husk extract

Synthesis of iron oxide nanoparticles has attracted increasing interest due to their importance in biomedical and technological applications. To investigate the ability of Juglans regia (J. regia) green husk extract in iron oxide nanoparticles size control, they were synthesized through co-precipitation method with J. regia extract and without it. For both tests, other experimental conditions were same. According to High-resolution transmission electron microscopy, the mean diameter and standard deviation of iron oxide nanoparticles and J. regia/iron oxide nanoparticles synthesized using co-precipitation method were 12.60 ± 2.87 and 5.77 ± 1.66 nm respectively. These results showed that J. regia/iron oxide nanoparticles synthesized using extract have a smaller size than nanoparticles fabricated by co-precipitation method; moreover, green husk extract plays the main role as size control. The obtained results of Powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), High resolution transmission electron microscopy (HR-TEM), Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), and Energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) are in good agreement with each other and confirm the high purity of fabricated magnetic nanoparticles using J. regia extract. Vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) revealed that the J. regia/iron oxide nanoparticles due to their proper magnetic properties have high saturation magnetization and low coercivity. According to FTIR spectrum, the J. regia would be coated on the iron oxide nanoparticles surface in a successful manner. The non-toxic effect of J. regia/iron oxide nanoparticles concentration below 1000 µg/ml was observed in the studies of in vitro cytotoxicity on normal and cancerous cell lines, respectively. The dose-dependent toxicity made it a suitable candidate for various medical applications.