Ethylene glycol

Titanium butoxide (TBOT) (97%), polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP, average molecular weight: 10000 g/mol) and hydrogen tetrachloroaurate trihydrate (HAuCl₄·3H₂O ≥ 99.9%) were purchased from Sigma-Aldrich. Anhydrous benzyl alcohol (99%) and pure ethanol (> 99.9%) was purchased from Scharlau, and ethylene glycol (EG ≥ 99%), HCl (37%) and acetone were purchased at Panreac. All materials were used as-received without further purification. Milli-Q water (MQ-H₂O) was used in all experiments.

Gelzan™ CM, calcium chloride, mineral oil, doxorubicin hydrochloride (Dox-HCl) and Span^® 85 were purchased from Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis, MO, USA). Gibco™ DMEM, Gib-co™ Fetal Bovine Serum (FBS), Gibco™ Penicillin-Streptomycin, Invitrogen™ Presto-Blue™ Cell Viability Reagent and Gibco™ Trypsin-EDTA (0.05%) were purchased from Thermo Fisher Scientific (Branchburg, NJ, USA). FITC Annexin V Apoptosis Detection Kit I was purchased from BD Pharmingen™ (San Diego, CA, USA). Sodium Nitrate, hydrogen peroxide and Sodium acetate were purchased from HAYASHI PURE CHEMICAL IND. (Osaka, Japan), Ltd. (HPC). Sulfuric Acid was purchased from UNION CHEMICAL WORKS Ltd. (Hsinchu, Taiwan). Potassium permanganate and ferric chloride were purchased from SHIMAKYU’S PURE CHEMICALS (Osaka, Japan). Ethylenediamine was purchased from ACROS Organics™ (Carlsbad, CA, USA). Ethylene glycol was purchased from PanReac AppliChem (Chicago, IL, USA). Graphite powder was donated from the Department of Public Health (Taichung, Taiwan), Chung Shan Medical University. All the samples in this study were sterilized in 70% (v/v) ethanol solution at 25 °C for 24 h. Next, samples were washed three times in sterile phosphate buffered saline (PBS) for five minutes each time. Finally, samples were dried or used directly for testing.