Microparticles Made with Silk Proteins for Melanoma Adjuvant Therapy

Melanoma is one of the most aggressive forms of skin cancer, which is characterized by metastasis and poor prognosis due to the limited effectiveness of current therapies and the toxicity of conventional drugs. For this reason and in recent years, one of the most promising strategies in the treatment of this form of cancer is the use of drug delivery systems as carriers capable of conveying the therapeutic agent into the tumor microenvironment, thus preventing its degradation and improving its safety and effectiveness profiles. In the present work, microparticles based on silk fibroin and epifibroin 0039, silk-derived proteins loaded with idebenone, were created, which act as therapeutic carriers for topical use in the treatment of melanoma. The resulting particles have a spherical shape, good loading efficiency, and release capacity of idebenone. Efficacy studies have demonstrated a reduction in the proliferation of COLO-38, melanoma tumor cells, while safety tests have demonstrated that the microparticles are not cytotoxic and do not possess prosensitizing activity. Notably, transdermal release studies revealed that all particles released idebenone over more days. The analysis of the stimulatory markers of the proinflammatory process, CD54 and CD86, did not show any increase in expression, thus confirming the absence of potential prosesensitization effects of the silk fibroin-based particles. The research, therefore, found that idebenone-loaded silk protein microparticles could effectively reduce the proliferation of melanoma cells without cytotoxicity. This indicates the promise of a safe and effective treatment of melanoma.