Synthesis and Evaluation of Guar Gum-Based 5-Fluorouracil-Loaded Nanoparticles for Improved and Controlled Drug Release Study

Guar Gum (GG) has been a well-studied biopolymer used for value added improvisation of various drugs or medicinal agents for various purposes. However, the microparticles formation of GG is predominantly reported, while the up conversion to nanoparticles and henceforth evaluation of nanoparticle with loaded drugs are not so well illustrated. In this study, we have undertaken manufacturing of GG nanoparticle to load anticancer drug 5-FU for treating colon cancer. GG is particularly suitable for orally colon-targeted drug delivery systems and 5 fluorouracil (5-FU) is used in the colorectal region for treating colorectal cancer. Drug loaded GG nanoparticles were characterized by FTIR, NMR, XRD, TEM, and DLS. Characterization by FT-IR, NMR, XRD, and TEM showed successful loading (via adsorption) of the drug over the biopolymeric nanoparticle and DLS revealed size of nanoparticles up to 585.3–838.7 nm as the hydrodynamic particle size of the loaded nanoparticle. The release study exhibited more than 99% drug release in the phosphate buffer of pH 6.8 within 10 h, and kinetic modelling showed the release followed a steady state zero order kinetics mimicking the Hixson–Crowell cube root type of release from the polymeric system.