Graphene oxide–hydroxyapatite nanocomposites effectively deliver HSV-TK suicide gene to inhibit human breast cancer growth

Abstract

Gene therapy with herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase gene (HSV-TK), which is also known as “suicide” gene therapy, is effective in various tumor models. The lack of a safe and efficient gene delivery system has become a major obstacle to “suicide” gene therapy. In this study, the cytotoxicity and transfection efficiency of graphene oxide–hydroxyapatite (GO–Hap) were analyzed by MTS and flow cytometry, respectively. A series of assays were performed to evaluate the effects of GO–HAp/p-HRE/ERE-Sur-TK combined with ganciclovir treatment on growth of human breast normal and cancer cells. The results showed that GO–HAp nanocomposites effectively transfected cells with minimum toxicity. GO–HAp/p-HRE/ERE-Sur-TK combined with ganciclovir treatment inhibited the proliferation and induced cell apoptosis in cancer cells, while the cytotoxic effects are tolerable in normal breast cells. We conclude that the GO–HAp nanocomposites have significant potential as a gene delivery vector for cancer therapy.