Theranostics 2017; 7(12):3007-3020. doi:10.7150/thno.18460 This issue Cite
Research Paper
1. Center of Super-Diamond and Advanced Films (COSDAF) & Department of Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, 83 Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, P. R. China;
2. Center of Super-Diamond and Advanced Films (COSDAF) & Department of Physics and Materials Science, City University of Hong Kong, 83 Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, P. R. China;
3. State Key Laboratory of Molecular Vaccinology and Molecular Diagnostics Center for Molecular Imaging and Translational Medicine, School of Public Health, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, P. R. China;
4. Department of Ultrasound, Xijing Hospital, Xi'an, Shaanxi 710032, P. R. China;
5. Functional Thin Films Research Center, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences;
6. Laboratory of Molecular Imaging and Nanomedicine (LOMIN), National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), National Institutes of Health (NIH), MD 20892, USA.
* These authors contributed equally to this work.
The development of nanoscaled theranostic agents for cancer combination therapies has received intensive attention in recent years. In this report, a degradable hollow mesoporous PEG-Si/C-DOX NP is designed and fabricated for pH-responsive, photoacoustic imaging-guided highly effective chemo-thermal combination therapy. The intrinsic hollow mesoporous structure endows the as-synthesized nanoparticles (NPs) with a high drug loading capacity (31.1%). Under NIR (808 nm) irradiation, the photothermal conversion efficiency of the Si/C NPs is as high as 40.7%. Preferential accumulation of the PEG-Si/C-DOX NPs around tumor tissue was demonstrated with photoacoustic images. Cellular internalization of the NPs and release of the DOX in nuclei are shown with fluorescent images. With efficient NIR photothermal conversion and high DOX loading capacity, the PEG-Si/C-DOX NPs are demonstrated to have remarkable cancer-cell-killing ability and to achieve complete in vivo tumor elimination via combinational chemo-thermal therapy. Last but not least, the NPs show good biodegradability and biosafety, making them a promising candidate for multifunctional drug delivery and cancer theranostic.
Keywords: degradable, silicon/carbon nanoparticles, photoacoustic imaging, chemo-thermal therapy.