Riccardo Di Santo

Dottore di ricerca

ciclo: XXXIII


supervisore: Giulio Caracciolo

Titolo della tesi: Biomedical applications of graphene oxide: from drug and gene delivery to cancer diagnosis

In the last decade, graphene oxide (GO) has been largely employed in biomedicine (such as for cancer therapy, drug delivery, imaging and biosensors) thanks to its unique structure i.e., graphene basal plane enriched with biocompatible functional groups like carboxylic and hydroxyl. In this thesis, we show off the potentialities of GO for several biomedical applications, including gene delivery, drug delivery and early-stage cancer detection. The development of a novel GO nano-platform for gene delivery applications is described in the first results section. Pristine GO cannot be used as a gene carrier because of the electrostatic repulsion with double-stranded DNA. To tackle this issue, GO nanoflakes were coated with cationic lipids by microfluidic mixing. The choice of the lipid composition in GO-cationic lipid nanoparticles (GOCL) is a key factor that affects their efficiency. We identified a specific GOCL composition that is efficient as Lipofectamine in transfecting cells but much less cytotoxic. Finally, in view of in vivo applications, we explore the interactions between GOCL nanoparticles and human plasma. In the next section, we demonstrate that doxorubicin (DOX)-loaded GO, GO-DOX, exhibits higher anticancer efficacy as compared to Liposomal-DOX, a popular anti-cancer chemotherapy drug. Fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy indicates that GO-DOX may realize its superior performances by producing huge intracellular DOX release upon binding to the cell membrane. In the last section, we show that the protein corona that forms around GO flakes in human plasma does not depend on GO lateral size but is affected by protein concentration. This finding may be important to exploit the protein corona for diagnostic purposes. In fact, we provide evidence that the protein corona of glioblastoma patients differs significantly from that of healthy individuals only at specific protein concentration. We believe that this study shall promote the development of advanced diagnostic technologies for early-stage cancer detection.

Produzione scientifica

11573/1659100 - 2022 - Multiplexed detection of pancreatic cancer by combining a nanoparticle-enabled blood test and plasma levels of acute-phase proteins
Caputo, D.; Coppola, A.; Quagliarini, E.; Di Santo, R.; Capriotti, A. L.; Cammarata, R.; Lagana, A.; Papi, M.; Digiacomo, L.; Coppola, R.; Pozzi, D.; Caracciolo, G. - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: CANCERS (Basel: MDPI) pp. - - issn: 2072-6694 - wos: WOS:000866838700001 (8) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85139835752 (8)

11573/1669548 - 2022 - Antenna-enhanced mid-infrared detection of extracellular vesicles derived from human cancer cell cultures
Temperini, Maria Eleonora; Di Giacinto, Flavio; Romanò, Sabrina; Di Santo, Riccardo; Augello, Alberto; Polito, Raffaella; Baldassarre, Leonetta; Giliberti, Valeria; Papi, Massimiliano; Basile, Umberto; Niccolini, Benedetta; Krasnowska, Ewa K; Serafino, Annalucia; De Spirito, Marco; Di Gaspare, Alessandra; Ortolani, Michele; Ciasca, Gabriele - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: JOURNAL OF NANOBIOTECHNOLOGY (London : BioMed Central.) pp. 530- - issn: 1477-3155 - wos: WOS:000898883900002 (3) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85144156067 (5)

11573/1551429 - 2021 - Protein corona profile of graphene oxide allows detection of glioblastoma multiforme using a simple one-dimensional gel electrophoresis technique. A proof-of-concept study
Di Santo, Riccardo; Quagliarini, Erica; Digiacomo, Luca; Pozzi, Daniela; Di Carlo, Angelina; Caputo, Damiano; Cerrato, Andrea; Montone, Carmela Maria; Mahmoudi, Morteza; Caracciolo, Giulio - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: BIOMATERIALS SCIENCE (Cambridge : Royal Society of Chemistry, 2013-) pp. 4671-4678 - issn: 2047-4830 - wos: WOS:000652629600001 (8) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85109073960 (11)

11573/1416248 - 2020 - Personalized graphene oxide-protein corona in the human plasma of pancreatic cancer patients
Di Santo, Riccardo; Digiacomo, Luca; Quagliarini, Erica; Capriotti, Anna Laura; Laganà, Aldo; Zenezini Chiozzi, Riccardo; Caputo, Damiano; Cascone, Chiara; Coppola, Roberto; Pozzi, Daniela; Caracciolo, Giulio - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: FRONTIERS IN BIOENGINEERING AND BIOTECHNOLOGY (Lausanne : Frontiers Editorial Office, 2013-) pp. - - issn: 2296-4185 - wos: WOS:000540503800001 (43) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85091417341 (46)

11573/1416238 - 2020 - Effect of protein corona on the transfection efficiency of lipid-coated graphene oxide-based cell transfection reagents
Quagliarini, E.; Di Santo, R.; Palchetti, S.; Ferri, G.; Cardarelli, F.; Pozzi, D.; Caracciolo, G. - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: PHARMACEUTICS (Basel: MDPI, 2009-) pp. - - issn: 1999-4923 - wos: WOS:000519268500083 (18) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85079032252 (19)

11573/1466693 - 2020 - Mechanistic insights into the release of doxorubicin from graphene oxide in cancer cells
Quagliarini, E.; Di Santo, R.; Pozzi, D.; Tentori, P.; Cardarelli, F.; Caracciolo, G. - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: NANOMATERIALS (Basel : MDPI) pp. - - issn: 2079-4991 - wos: WOS:000567663200001 (20) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85090649973 (25)

11573/1416233 - 2019 - Microfluidic-generated lipid-graphene oxide nanoparticles for gene delivery
Di Santo, R.; Quagliarini, E.; Palchetti, S.; Pozzi, D.; Palmieri, V.; Perini, G.; Papi, M.; Capriotti, A. L.; Lagana, A.; Caracciolo, G. - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS (New York: American Institute of Physics) pp. 233701- - issn: 0003-6951 - wos: WOS:000471696100043 (21) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85067237550 (23)

11573/1247462 - 2019 - Microfluidic manufacturing of surface-functionalized graphene oxide nanoflakes for gene delivery
Di Santo, Riccardo; Digiacomo, Luca; Palchetti, Sara; Palmieri, Valentina; Perini, Giordano; Pozzi, Daniela; Papi, Massimiliano; Caracciolo, Giulio - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: NANOSCALE (Cambridge,UK: RCS PUBLISHING -Royal Society of Chemistry) pp. 2733-2741 - issn: 2040-3364 - wos: WOS:000459579400015 (53) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85061155293 (64)

11573/1113522 - 2018 - Curcumin-loaded graphene oxide flakes as an effective antibacterial system against methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus
Bugli, F.; Cacaci, M.; Palmieri, V.; Di Santo, R.; Torelli, R.; Ciasca, G.; Di Vito, M.; Vitali, A.; Conti, C.; Sanguinetti, M.; De Spirito, M.; Papi, M. - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: INTERFACE FOCUS (London : Royal Society, 2011-) pp. - - issn: 2042-8898 - wos: WOS:000430570600008 (59) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85045918256 (64)

11573/1113514 - 2017 - INSIDIA: A FIJI Macro Delivering High-Throughput and High-Content Spheroid Invasion Analysis
Moriconi, Chiara; Palmieri, Valentina; Di Santo, Riccardo; Tornillo, Giusy; Papi, Massimiliano; Pilkington, Geoff; De Spirito, Marco; Gumbleton, Mark - 01a Articolo in rivista
rivista: BIOTECHNOLOGY JOURNAL (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH.) pp. 1700140- - issn: 1860-6768 - wos: WOS:000413347900006 (19) - scopus: 2-s2.0-85028932980 (20)

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