Comparative Evaluation of Green-Synthesized Silver Nanoparticles from Ficus glomerata and Artocarpus heterophyllus Bark Extracts: Physicochemical Characteristics, Safety and Antitumor Potential

Abstract

Background: Plant-mediated synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) combines the reducing and stabilizing capacity of phytochemicals with the physicochemical and biological properties of silver. The two source manuscripts evaluated bark-derived AgNPs from Ficus glomerata (FG-B) and Artocarpus heterophyllus (AH-B), respectively, using broadly comparable in vitro and in vivo cancer models.
Objective: To prepare a structured comparative assessment of the phytochemical content, nanoparticle characteristics, acute oral safety and anticancer performance of FG-B AgNPs and AH-B AgNPs using the reported data from both manuscripts.
Methods: Reported total phenolic and flavonoid contents, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), dynamic light scattering (DLS), zeta potential, X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), acute oral toxicity, MTT cytotoxicity against MCF-7 cells, Trypan Blue Exclusion (TBE) against HeLa cells, and Ehrlich Ascites Carcinoma (EAC) outcomes were extracted and compared descriptively. Both manuscripts used 50 mg/kg AgNP treatment in the EAC model and 2000 mg/kg for acute oral toxicity.
Results: FG-B extract contained higher total phenolics (91.3 ± 1.4 mg GAE/g) and flavonoids (72.5 ± 1.0 mg QE/g) than AH-B (84.5 ± 1.2 mg GAE/g and 67.2 ± 0.9 mg QE/g, respectively). FG-B AgNPs were larger by DLS (67.9 ± 1.1 nm) than AH-B AgNPs (51.1 ± 0.9 nm), while both exhibited moderately negative zeta potentials (−23.88 ± 1.4 and −21.69 ± 1.6 mV, respectively). AH-B AgNPs showed FTIR evidence of hydroxyl, carbonyl, amide and aromatic functional-group involvement, whereas FTIR was not reported in the FG-B manuscript. MTT IC₅₀ values were 19.4 ± 1.2 µg/mL for FG-B and 23.6 ± 1.4 µg/mL for AH-B. TBE IC₅₀ values were 15.4 ± 0.6 and 18.6 ± 0.7 µg/mL, respectively. In the EAC model, FG-B AgNPs reduced reported viable tumor cells from 10.5 ± 0.6 to 4.1 ± 0.3 ×10⁶ cells/mL, while AH-B AgNPs reduced them from 11.3 ± 0.6 to 5.8 ± 0.4 ×10⁶ cells/mL. Both formulations produced apoptotic morphology and DNA laddering and showed no mortality or overt toxicity at 2000 mg/kg.
Conclusion: Within the limitations of a descriptive cross-manuscript comparison, FG-B AgNPs demonstrated stronger reported in vitro cytotoxicity and greater reduction in viable EAC tumor cells, while AH-B AgNPs provided the smaller DLS particle size and additional FTIR evidence of phytochemical capping. Both preparations showed favorable short-term safety and promising antitumor activity. A controlled head-to-head study using identical synthesis conditions, analytical methods, doses, cell passages and statistical design is required to establish comparative superiority.