Hadi Zare-Zardini - Department of Biotechnology, Faculty of Advanced Sciences and Technologies, University of Isfahan, Isfahan,Iran#Hematology and Oncology Research Center, Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences and Health Services, Yazd, Iran
Ahmad Amiri - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Mehdi Shanbedi - Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran
Farzaneh Fesahat - Researches and Clinical Center for Infertility, Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences, Yazd, Iran

Cancer is one of the biggest diseases that kill a lot of people in the entire world. Even withdevelopment of different pharmaceutical agents, this disease is one the biggest challenge inscience. So, investigation for development of new compounds for cancer therapies is veryactive. In between, nanostructures such as carbon nanotubes were considered recently. Theaim of this study is investigation of anticancer activity of pristine and functionalizedmultiwalled carbon nanotubes with basic amino acids, lysine and arginine. Multi-walledcarbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) were first functionalized by arginine and lysine undermicrowave radiation. Surface functionalization was confirmed by Fourier transform infrared(FTIR) spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and transmission electron microscopy (TEM).After the MWCNTs were functionalized by arginine and lysine, the cytotoxic effect of pristineand functionalized MWCNTs on breast cancer cell line (T47d) was investigated. Anticanceractivity of all treated samples was observed significantly against examined cancerous cellline. Based on the observed results, the sequence of activity was MWCNTs-arginine >MWCNTs-lysine > pristine MWCNTs. The functionalized MWCNTs were especially moreeffective against cell growth than pristine MWCNTs. Due to high negative charge ofcancerous cell, the enhanced anticancer activity of functionalized MWCNTs was attributed toelectrostatic adsorption of cancerous cell due to positive charges of the functional groups onMWCNTs surface. In this study, it observed a significant decrease in cell survival in cellstreated with the functionalized MWCNTs by arginine and lysine in compared with pristineMWCNTs.

Anticancer Activity, Amino Acid, Arginine, Breast Cancer Cell, Carbon Nanotubes, Lysine