School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 70 Nanyang Drive, 637459, Singapore.
State of Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, Key Laboratory of Bioactive Materials, Ministry of Education, College of Life Sciences, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China.
Biomaterials. 2017 Nov;145:168-177. doi: 10.1016/j.biomaterials.2017.08.037. Epub 2017 Aug 24.
Chemo-photothermal nanotheranostics has the advantage of synergistic therapeutic effect, providing opportunities for optimized cancer therapy. However, current chemo-photothermal nanotheranostic systems generally comprise more than three components, encountering the potential issues of unstable nanostructures and unexpected conflicts in optical and biophysical properties among different components. We herein synthesize an amphiphilic semiconducting polymer (PEG-PCB) and utilize it as a multifunctional nanocarrier to simplify chemo-photothermal nanotheranostics. PEG-PCB has a semiconducting backbone that not only serves as the diagnostic component for near-infrared (NIR) fluorescence and photoacoustic (PA) imaging, but also acts as the therapeutic agent for photothermal therapy. In addition, the hydrophobic backbone of PEG-PCB provides strong hydrophobic and π-π interactions with the aromatic anticancer drug such as doxorubicin for drug encapsulation and delivery. Such a trifunctionality of PEG-PCB eventually results in a greatly simplified nanotheranostic system with only two components but multimodal imaging and therapeutic capacities, permitting effective NIR fluorescence/PA imaging guided chemo-photothermal therapy of cancer in living mice. Our study thus provides a molecular engineering approach to integrate essential properties into one polymer for multimodal nanotheranostics.
化疗-光热纳米诊疗一体化具有协同治疗效果的优势，为优化癌症治疗提供了机会。然而，目前的化疗-光热纳米诊疗一体化系统通常由三个以上的组件组成，会遇到纳米结构不稳定和不同组件之间的光学和生物物理性质不协调等潜在问题。我们在这里合成了一种两亲性半导体聚合物（PEG-PCB），并将其用作多功能纳米载体，以简化化疗-光热纳米诊疗一体化。PEG-PCB 具有半导体主链，不仅可用作近红外（NIR）荧光和光声（PA）成像的诊断组件，还可用作光热治疗的治疗剂。此外，PEG-PCB 的疏水主链为阿霉素等芳香族抗癌药物提供了强大的疏水性和π-π相互作用，用于药物封装和递送。PEG-PCB 的这种三重功能最终导致了一个简化的纳米诊疗一体化系统，其中只有两种成分，但具有多模态成像和治疗能力，可在活体小鼠中实现有效的 NIR 荧光/PA 成像引导的化疗-光热治疗。因此，我们的研究为将基本特性集成到一种聚合物中用于多模态纳米诊疗一体化提供了一种分子工程方法。
