Effect of Silver Coating on Barium Titanium Oxide Nanoparticle Toxicity

Nanoparticles are presently being studied for optical and biomedical applications such as medical imaging and drug delivery. Nanoparticles impact the cellular environment due to many variables such as size, shape, and composition. How these factors affect cell viability is not fully understood. The purpose of this study is to test the toxicity effects of silver coating (Ag@) Barium Titanium Oxide (BaTiO₃) nanoparticles on Rhesus Monkey Retinal Endothelial cells (RhREC's) in culture. The addition of silver to the nanoparticles increases their nonlinear optical properties significantly, making the Ag@BaTiO₃ nanoparticles good candidates for nonlinear microscopy contrast agents. We hypothesize that by silver coating nanoparticles, there will be an increase in cell viability at higher concentrations when compared to non-silver coated nanoparticles. RhREC's were treated with BaTiO₃ and Ag@BaTiO₃ at concentrations of 0, 1.0, 10.0, and 100µg/ml for 24 hours at 37°C + 5%CO₂. After 24 hour incubation with respective nanoparticles, cell viability was determined using the trypan blue dye-exclusion method. Treatment with 0, 1.0 and 10.0µg/ml of Ag@BaTiO₃ had minimal effect on cell viability, with 90% viable cells remaining at the end of the 24 hours treatment period. However, cells treated with 100µg/ml of Ag@BaTiO₃ resulted in a decrease to 51% viable cells. Comparatively, cells treated with 0, 1.0 and 10µg/ml of BaTiO₃ had no significant effect on cell viability (90% viable cells after treatment) while the 100µg/ml treatment resulted in a decrease to 29% viable cells. These results show that silver coating of BaTiO₃ nanoparticles has a protective effect on cellular toxicity at high concentrations.