Probing suitable therapeutic nanoparticles for controlled drug delivery and diagnostic reproductive health biomarker development.

Nanomaterial mediated drug delivery represents a highly promising technique while its selectivity for reproductive healthcare application still remains a challenge. Since the delicate structure and functional role of reproductive tissue and gametes require the use of biocompatible nanomedicine/devices that do not affect fertility or the development of resulting offspring, this paper reports an intercomparative study of human spermatozoa interaction with three different nanoparticles (NPs) namely; iron oxide (Fe3O4), multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) and graphene platelet nanopowder (GPN) to probe their suitability for drug delivery carrier and biomarker development purposes. ATR-FTIR results revealed that the sperm cell interaction with GPN had maximum amide I absorption for cell proteins and CO stretching of the peptide backbone at the band around 1657 cm(-1) followed by iron oxide NPs whereas MWCNT had no absorption.