Eco-friendly synthesis of ZnO nanoparticles using pomegranate leaves and its antimicrobial, antioxidant, anticancer, angiogenic activity, and toxicity assessment

Green-synthesized nanoparticles are cost-effective, environment-friendly, and less hazardous, with potentially diverse biological applications. Nanoparticles of zinc oxide (ZnO) were generated with an aqueous extract of dried pomegranate leaves and characterized using X-ray diffractometry, Infrared and UV–visible spectroscopy, and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) tools. The synthesized ZnO nanoparticles (NPs) demonstrated comparable and enhanced antioxidant potential to the leaf extract or zinc nitrate. These ZnO nanoparticles showed antimicrobial efficacy, noticeably against C. albicans, E. faecalis, and P. aeruginosa. Though the MTT (3-(4,5-Dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide) assays indicated more significant toxicity to normal cells (HaCaT) than malignant cells (MCF-7), the recorded anticancer efficacy of our nanoparticles was more pronounced than that of other reported nanoparticles. The chorioallantoic membrane assay, deployed to assess the angiogenic potential of the nanoparticles, unveiled dose-dependent promotion or inhibition of vascular sprouting activity. The toxicological effects of the synthesized nanoparticles on the early embryos were examined utilizing Zebrafish as a model organism. The death rate of early treated embryos was found to be directly proportional to the nanoparticle doses. At low doses, the ZnO nanoparticles did not hamper the development of embryos. In contrast, the embryos that survived higher ZnO concentrations exhibited developmental defects, primarily in hatching rate, eye pigmentation, and tail deformities, which were monitored until 72 h post-fertilization. The ZnO nanoparticles synthesized in the present study exhibited remarkable antioxidant, anticancer, and anti-angiogenic potentials, which warrant further thorough investigations into their potential applications in medicine.