A Molecular Dynamic Study of Layered Hydroxide Induced Depletion of Mobile Anions within the Extracellular Medium

The strong surface electric charge density of clay mineral host nanolayers enables their use as host-guest nanohybrids in many different areas of application. In particular, layered double hydroxides (LDH) of metals have found applications in medicine. Drug-LDH or gene-LDH nanohybrids are used for targeted delivery of biomedical agents to diseased cells or cancer cells. Fragments of the LDH host nanolayers may remain both within the cell and in the extracellular medium after drug delivery. How these charged nanosheets affect the cell electrostatics is still poorly understood. In the present paper, the idealized case of a single pure Mg-2/Al-LDH nanolayer interacting with the extracellular anion environment was investigated to estimate the order of magnitude of a possible shift of the cell membrane equilibrium potential. An approximate dependence of the change in the chloride equilibrium membrane potential on the concentration of pure Mg-2/Al-LDH nanosheets was determined.