Investigating the effect of soluble and insoluble medicinal substances on cell wall orientation
Neda Ebrahimpour
1
(
Department of Chemical Industry, National University of Skills (NUS), Tehran, Iran
)
Mohammad Sadegh Zakerhamidi
2
(
Faculty of Physics, University of Tabriz, Tabriz, Iran
)
Amid Ranjkesh
3
(
Condenced Matter Department, J.Stefan Institute, Jmova 39, Ljubljana, Slovenia
)
Roshanak Kian
4
(
Faculty of Physics, University of Tabriz, Tabriz, Iran
)
Keywords: Cell Wall, Liquid Crystal, Nanoparticle, Dielectric Constant, Refractive Index.,
Abstract :
Considering that the cell wall is the first defense and control barrier of medicinal substances into the cell, any dielectric behavior of this divider can lead to harm to the cell or the absorption of substances from the environment; hence, examining the dielectric and physicochemical behavior of the anisotropic cell wall is imperative. The present study employs 1102 (a mixture of liquid crystal) as an anisotropic environment, similar to the cell wall. Insoluble nanoparticle, Lithium disilicate (Li2Si2O5) employed as non-reactive material, while materials containing active agents are used as soluble materials like Retinol (C20H30O). At various dopant concentrations, the dielectric characteristics and optical anisotropies of the liquid crystal and dopant mixture were observed, and the resulting data was analyzed and studied results indicate that the shape of the insoluble dopant influences the molecular order of the liquid crystal bulk, while for soluble substances, the percentage of dopant is more significant than the shape of dopants in the ordering of anisotropic media.
[1] Kieran J.D. Lee, Susan E. Marcus, J. Paul Knox, “Cell Wall Biology: Perspectives from Cell Wall Imaging”, Molecular Plant, Vol. 4, Issue 2, pp. 212-219,2011.
[2] Yang NJ, Hinner MJ. “Getting across the cell membrane: an overview for small molecules, peptides, and proteins.” Methods Mol Biol. Vol. 1266, pp. 29-53, 2015.
[3] Zachowski A. “Phospholipids in animal eukaryotic membranes: transverse asymmetry and movement.”Biochem J. Vol. 294, pp.1–14, 1993.
[4] Kansy M, Senner F, Gubernator K. “Physicochemical high throughput screening: parallel artificial membrane permeation assay in the description of passive absorption processes.” J Med Chem. Vol. 4, pp. 1007–1010, 1998.
[5] Johannes L, Römer W. Shiga toxins “from cell biology to biomedical applications.” Nat Rev Microbiol. Vol. 8, pp.105–116, 2010.
[6] Baskin, Tobias I. "Anisotropic expansion of the plant cell wall." Annu. Rev. Cell Dev. Biol.Vol, 21, no. 1, pp. 203-222, 2005.
[7] Landrein, Benoît, and Olivier Hamant. "How mechanical stress controls microtubule behavior and morphogenesis in plants: history, experiments and revisited theories." The Plant Journal, Vol. 75, pp. 324-338, 2013.
[8] Jarvis, Michael C., and Maureen C. McCann. "Macromolecular biophysics of the plant cell wall: concepts and methodology." Plant Physiology and Biochemistry, Vol. 38, pp. 1-13, 2000.
[9] Voxeur, Aline, and Herman Höfte. "Cell wall integrity signaling in plants:“To grow or not to grow that's the question”." Glycobiology, Vol. 26, pp. 950-960, 2016.
[10] Liu, Ke, Zhimao Yang, and Hitoshi Takagi. "Anisotropic thermal conductivity of unidirectional natural abaca fiber composites as a function of lumen and cell wall structure." Composite structures, Vol. 108, pp. 987-991.
[11] Gkolemis, K., E. Giannoutsou, ID S. Adamakis, B. Galatis, and P. Apostolakos. "Cell wall anisotropy plays a key role in Zea mays stomatal complex movement: the possible role of the cell wall matrix." PlantMolecular Biology, Vol. 113, no. 6, pp. 331-351, 2023.
[12] Sendra, Marta, P. M. Yeste, Ignacio Moreno-Garrido, José Manuel Gatica, and Julián Blasco. "CeO2 NPs, toxic or protective to phytoplankton? Charge of nanoparticles and cell wall as factors which cause changes in cell complexity." Science of The Total Environment, Vol. 590, pp. 304-315, 2017.
[13] Milewska-Hendel, Anna, Katarzyna Sala, WeronikaGepfert, and EwaKurczyńska. "Gold nanoparticles-induced modifications in cell wall composition in barley roots." Cells, Vol. 10, no. 8, pp. 1965, 2021.
[14] Cui, Jianghu, Yadong Li, Qian Jin, and Fangbai Li. "Silica nanoparticles inhibit arsenic uptake into rice suspension cells via improving pectin synthesis and the mechanical force of the cell wall." Environmental Science: Nano, Vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 162-171, 2020.
[15] Das, Debabrata, and Giasuddin Ahmed. "Silver nanoparticles damage yeast cell wall." J. Biotechnol, Vol. 3, pp. 36-39, 2012.
[16] Stephen, Michael J., and Joseph P. Straley. "Physics of liquid crystals." Reviews of Modern Physics, Vol. 46, no. 4, pp. 617, 1974.
[17] Kian R, Zakerhamidi MS, Ranjkesh A, Shamkhali AN, Taheri B, Varshney SK, Yoon TH, “Investigation of the spectroscopic features along with the media polarity effect in some symmetrical disc-shaped liquid crystals,” J. Mol. Liq, Vol. 309, pp. 13226, 2020.
[18] Ranjkesh, Amid, Neda Ebrahimpour, Mohammad Sadegh Zakerhamidi, and Seyed Masoud Seyedahmadian. "Temperature-dependent dielectric property of a nematic liquid crystal doped with two differently–shaped tungsten oxide (W18O49) nanostructures." Journal of Molecular Liquids Vol. 348, pp. 118024, 2022.
[19] Zakerhamidi, M. S., S. Shoarinejad, and S. Mohammadpour. "Fe3O4 nanoparticle effect on dielectric and ordering behavior of nematic liquid crystal host." Journal of Molecular Liquids, Vol. 191, pp. 16-19, 2014.
[20] Sadigh, M. Khadem, M. S. Zakerhamidi, and A. Ranjkesh. "Enhanced electro-optical nonlinear responses of doped nematic liquid crystals: Towards optoelectronic devices." Optics and Lasers in Engineering, Vol. 159, pp. 107229, 2022.
[21] Osipov, Mikhail A., and Maxim V. Gorkunov. "Nematic liquid crystals doped with nanoparticles: Phase behavior and dielectric properties." In Liquid Crystals with Nano and Microparticles, pp. 135-175. 2017.
[22] Tyagi, Yogeshvar. "Liquid crystals: An approach to different state of matter." The Pharma Innovation, Vol. 7, no. 5, Part H, pp. 540, 2018.
[23] Burrows, Nathan D., Ariane M. Vartanian, Nardine S. Abadeer, Elissa M. Grzincic, Lisa M. Jacob, Wayne Lin, Ji Li, Jordan M. Dennison, Joshua G. Hinman, and Catherine J. Murphy. "Anisotropic nanoparticles and anisotropic surface chemistry." The journal of physical chemistry letters, Vol. 7, pp. 632-641, 2016.
Research Article
Investigating the effect of soluble and insoluble medicinal substances on cell wall orientation
N. Ebrahimpour a, M. Sadegh Zakerhamidi b, A. Ranjkeshc, R. Kiana,b
a Department of Chemical Industry, National University of Skills (NUS), Tehran, Iran b Faculty of Physics, University of Tabriz, Iran cCondensed Matter Department, J.Stefan Institute, Jmova 39, Ljubljana, Slovenia |
*Corresponding Author Email: neda.ebrahimpour@gmail.com
DOI: 10.71498/ijbbe.2024.1190467
Received: Nov. 14, 2024, Revised: Jan. 3, 2025, Accepted: Jan. 26, 2025, Available Online: Feb. 18, 2025
Considering that the cell wall is the first defense and control barrier of medicinal substances into the cell, any dielectric behavior of this divider can lead to harm to the cell or the absorption of substances from the environment; hence, examining the dielectric and physicochemical behavior of the anisotropic cell wall is imperative. The present study employs 1102 (a mixture of liquid crystals) as an anisotropic environment, similar to the cell wall. In insoluble nanoparticles, Lithium disilicate (Li2Si2O5) is employed as a non-reactive material, while materials containing active agents are used as soluble materials like Retinol (C20H30O). At various dopant concentrations, the dielectric characteristics and optical anisotropies of the liquid crystal and dopant mixture were observed, and the resulting data was analyzed and studied results indicate that the shape of the insoluble dopant influences the molecular order of the liquid crystal bulk, while for soluble substances, the percentage of dopant is more significant than the shape of dopants in the ordering of anisotropic media.
I. Introduction
It is believed that cells are the smallest building blocks of life. Every cell has a cytoplasm and a cell wall. The cell wall, which is regarded as the cell border, is a coating that envelops the cytoplasm or the contents [1]. The cell wall performs the following functions: bulk transport: exocytosis and endocytosis, markers and signaling, metabolic activities, mechanical structure, defines and encloses the cell, selective permeability, dynamic transport, and so on [2],[3]. As is well known, the cell wall is a dynamic, complex structure made up of a bilayer of phospholipids. The hydrophilic groups cover the inner and outer surfaces of the phospholipids, whereas the hydrophobic ends of the lipids create an intermediate layer. The foundation of membranes is made up of lipid bilayers, and cholesterol may control how fluid the membrane is. Numerous proteins are essential for the operations of the cell membrane, including signal transduction and ion transport [4],[5]. Charged ions and electrons are unable to pass across the wall in large quantities. They may pass across membranes from membrane-spanning protein semiconductors and specialized ion channels, respectively [6]. The anisotropic behavior of living cell walls has been confirmed by several studies and researches [7]-[9]. Thus, by applying special environmental qualifications, it is achievable to impact the anisotropic properties of the cellular system and induce desired behaviors in it [8]. Properties such as the dielectric properties and physicochemical behavior of cell walls can be improved by taking advantage of this anisotropic property [9]-[11]. There is a large body of published literature demonstrating that the presence of nano-dopants in the environment interacting with the cell walls can affect the above properties [12]-[14]. The extent of these changes depends largely on the shape of the dopants in the environment and their concentration [15].
Substances that flow like liquids but yet have some of the crystals' ordered structure are known as liquid crystals [16],[17]. Molecules in liquid crystals typically exhibit elongation and directionality. Between the crystalline (solid) and isotropic (liquid) phases, there is a unique phase of matter known as the liquid crystal state [18]. Since liquid crystals are anisotropic materials, the system's average alignment with the direction affects its physical characteristics. A high alignment indicates a highly anisotropic material. Likewise, the material is nearly isotropic if the alignment is modest [19].
Nematic liquid crystal materials are characterized by long-range orientation order but lack translational order. A form of optical anisotropy called birefringence is also present in most NLCs (Nematic Liquid Crystals). Birefringence is seen in liquid-crystalline phases because of the parallel order of molecules that exhibit anisotropy in polarizability. The amplitude and sign of the birefringence are determined by the composition and organization of the liquid-crystalline phase and the polarizability properties of the constituent molecules [20],[21]. As previously mentioned, liquid crystals and cell walls share many of the same characteristics, like orientational organization, three-dimensional designs, and anisotropic properties, making them an ideal choice to study the anisotropic behavior of cell walls in the presence of nano dopants [22],[23],[25]. It is also possible to use nanoscale pharmaceutical substances as dopants and study the effect of their presence in different concentrations and morphologies on the anisotropic properties of cell wall [24],[27].
II. Experimental
A. Materials
The present study employs 1102 (a mixture of liquid crystal) as an anisotropic environment, similar to the cell wall. LC (Liquid Crystal) 1102 (TNI = 80.50 C), is essentially a mixed cyanobiphenyl liquid crystal that is used in both industrial and research applications. The manufacturing company has a patent on the materials that make up Liquid Crystal 1102.
Insoluble nanoparticle, lithium disilicate (Li2Si2O5) crystals of 50-60 nm are employed as non-reactive material, while materials containing active agents are used as soluble materials like Retinol (C20H30O) (CAS No.68-28-8). Mixtures of the liquid crystal composition and the dopants with different weight ratios (0.1%, 0.3%, and 0.7% w/w%) were prepared. The nano dopants were added to the NLC in the isotropic phase of 1102, and the mixture was sonicated for six hours to complete the doping process and their dielectric constants and refractive indices were measured in a specific temperature range.
B. Liquid crystal cell preparation
To create the LC cells, the NP-NLC (Nano Particles- Liquid Crystal) solutions were sandwiched between two 1.2 cm2 optical glass plates that had transparent electrodes composed of indium tin oxide (ITO) layers. By applying a polyvinyl alcohol surface treatment and rubbing, the sample cells were arranged in a parallel fashion or homogenous orientation. We treated the LC cells' surfaces with lecithin to enable homeotropic alignment. The distance between the electrode surfaces, which was 1µm, was fixed using a Mylar sheet which set the thickness of the liquid crystalline samples. Lastly, epoxy resin glue was employed as a sealing material to attach the plates.
C. Refractive index measurement
Abbe's refractometer (Bellingham Stanley Abbe 60ED) has been used to measure the refractive index with an accuracy of 0.00001. Abbe's refractor ocular has a polarizer sheet installed to block the unusual rays. This eliminates the boundary line's contrast. Water was circulated in a water bath temperature controller to regulate the temperature of Abbe's refractometer. A thermometer with an accuracy of ±0.01 °C was placed close to the sample to measure the temperature. The extraordinary refractive index, ne, is too high to be measured with the available refractometer, but the ordinary refractive index, no, can be directly measured in the nematic phase. As a result, ne at every temperature was calculated using 
. The extrapolated average refractive index, or <n>, in this case, is the result of extending the isotropic phase's (niso) refractive index into the range of the nematic phase. Birefringence (Δn = ne−no) of the nematic phase for the examined LCs was computed using these data.
The order parameter S for the pure liquid crystal sample and the NP-NLC samples (0.1%, 0.3% and 0.7% w/w%) can be computed using the obtained values for the refractive indices and Vuks assumption:
(1)
Where ∆α= αe-αo is anisotropy of polarizability and α demonstrates mean molecular polarizability. We exploit 
for estimating respective molecular polarizabilities (αe, αo) and N is the number of molecules per unit volume and <n2> is defined as 
.
Plotting the linear portion of 
versus ln (1-
) allows for the determination of
, This can be extended to T=0K. The scaling factor ∆α/α is determined by the intercept at T= 0K, where a completely ordered structure exists (S=1). Order parameter S values at various temperatures can be obtained by assuming that ∆α/α stays constant across all temperatures and entering this value into Eq. (1).
D. Dielectric measurement
The dielectric measurements have been performed by an LCR meter having an accuracy of 0.0005. Instek LCR 819, which is combined with a cell temperature controller, the temperature was stabilized with the accuracy of 0.01 °C. For dielectric measurements, a sandwiched capacitance sample with an aligner layer of polymer was utilized. Parallel and perpendicular directions were used to measure the dielectric. At various temperatures, the capacitance values of the sample were ascertained in both its filled and empty forms. Once the impacts of the conductive, ITO layer, and alignment polymer layer are eliminated using Eqs. (2), (3) the change in capacitance will yield the value of the real part of permittivity.
| (2) |
| (3) |
