PVP-coated SbSe nanorods as nanotheranostic agents for photoacoustic imaging and photothermal therapy in NIR-I bio-windows.

Antimony selenide (SbSe) as a simple, low toxicity, low-cost p-type semiconductor material with broad absorbance ranging from the UV to the NIR region has many potential applications in photovoltaic, thermoelectric, and phase-change memory devices. Owing to these excellent properties, SbSe nanorods were firstly synthesized with triphenylantimony and dibenzyldiselenide under solvothermal conditions. In order to enhance the biocompatibility of the SbSe nanorods, polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) was coated onto the surface of the SbSe nanorods to form PVP-coated SbSe nanorods. The cell viability of PVP-coated SbSe nanorods toward Hep-2 cells was assessed for 24 h using a Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) assay. The results showed that Hep-2 cells treated with PVP-coated SbSe nanorods were alive at a concentration as high as 100 μg mL in the absence of NIR irradiation. assessment confirmed that PVP-coated SbSe nanorods exhibited excellent photoacoustic imaging and PTT performance, which yielded complete ablation of tumors after laser irradiation (808 nm or 980 nm) in the NIR-I bio-window.