nanoZER: The Future for Safe Leukaemia Treatment

Leukemia, a blood or bone marrow cancer, is the seventh most common cancer in humans of all ages with the highest incidence among children aged 14 year or less. In the United States, an estimated 48,610 new leukemia cases with 23,620 deaths were reported in 2013. Among these fatalities were children, comprising of 30% of the cases. ZERUMBONE, the natural predominant compound in the rhizome of Zingiber Zerumbet, has poor water-solubility. We have developed the ZERUMBONE loaded nanostructured lipid carrier by high pressure homogenization technique. The ZERUMBONE-NLC was shown to have anticancer properties and is particularly efficacious in the treatment of a human lymphoblastic leukaemia cell line. Physicochemical and stability characterization showed that ZERUMBONE-NLC possesses all the characteristics of an excellent delivery system for ZERUMBONE. Although ZERUMBONE-NLC was shown to exhibit anti-leukemia properties in vitro, its in vivo effect was uncertain. Thus, the present study was conducted to determine the effect of ZERUMBONE-NLC on murine myelomonocytic leukemia in a BALB/c mice model. The murine system was chosen because of ease in the established.