Vitamin C-driven epirubicin loading into liposomes

The encapsulation of anticancer drugs in a liposome structure protects the drug during circulation and increases drug accumulation in the cancer tissue and antitumor activity while decreasing drug toxicity. This paper presents a new method of active drug loading based on a vitamin C pH/ion gradient. Formulations were characterized in terms of the following parameters: optimal external pH, time and drug-to-lipid ratio for the purpose of remote loading, and in vitro stability. In the case of the selected drug, epirubicin (EPI), its coencapsulation increases its anticancer activity through a possibly synergistic effect previously reported by other groups for a free nonencapsulated drug/vitamin C cocktail. The method also has another advantage over other remote-loading methods: it allows faster drug release through liposome destabilization at the tumor site, thanks to the very good solubility of the EPI vitamin C salt, as seen on cryogenic transmission electron microscopy images. This influences the drug-release process and increases the anticancer activity of the liposome formulation. The liposomes are characterized as stable, with very good pharmacokinetics (half-life 18.6 hours). The antitumor activity toward MCF-7 and 4T-1 breast cancer cells was higher in the case of EPI loaded via our gradient than via an ammonium sulfate gradient. Finally, the EPI liposomal formulation and the free drug were tested using the murine 4T-1 breast cancer model. The antitumor activity of the encapsulated drug was confirmed (tumor-growth inhibition over 40% from day 16 until the end of the experiment), and the free drug was shown to have no anticancer activity at the tested dose.