Harnessing Dual Phototherapy and Immune Activation for Cancer Treatment: The Development and Application of BODIPY@F127 Nanoparticles

New NIR-Activated Organic Molecule-Based Nanocomposite as an Efficient Sensitizer for Photothermal and Photodynamic Therapy of Cancer

Acceptor-donor-acceptor (A-D-A)-configured molecules with coplanar dithieno[2,3-d:2',3'-d']thieno[3,2-b:3',2'-b']dipyrrole (DTPT) as the core are promising organic semiconductor materials utilized in organic photovoltaic devices owing to their efficient charge transportation capabilities. In addition to optoelectronic applications, they are potential in photothermal and photodynamic applications due to their light-absorption properties. This study evaluates the utilization of DTPT-based fused-ring-conjugated small molecules with strong near-infrared (NIR) absorption as stable organic photosensitizers for phototherapy by forming nanoparticles (NPs) with D-α-tocopherol polyethylene glycol 1000 succinate (TPGS). Among them, NPs prepared from the 2-(3-cyano-4,5,5-trimethylfuran-2(5H)-ylidene)malononitrile (TCF) end-capping DTPT-centered molecule, DTPTTCF, exhibit low cytotoxicity, enhance photothermal conversion efficiency and superior photodynamic activity. In vitro and in vivo experiments demonstrate the remarkable anticancer efficacy of DTPTTCF@TPGS NPs that can effectively suppress cancer cell proliferation under 808 nm laser treatment. Additionally, soft X-ray tomography (SXT) is employed as a high-resolution tool to observe intracellular variations that reveal distinct vacuolization in the NPs + Laser treated group. These observations highlight that the DTPTTCF@TPGS NPs cause significant damage to cancer cells under NIR irradiation. Furthermore, in vivo, experiments demonstrate the apoptosis of cancer cells within tumor tissues and the effective elimination of tumors upon NIR irradiation of DTPTTCF@TPGS NPs treated mice. This work manifests the potential application of the DTPT-cored A-D-A-type molecule as an advanced agent for tumor phototherapy with enhanced efficacy and selectivity.

Unravelling the influence of structure on the optical properties of a pair of aza-BODIPY isomers and their application in photodynamic therapy

A pair of aza-BODIPY isomers, 1,7-di-tert-butyl-3,5-dinaphthyl (Nap-BDP) and 1,7-dinaphthyl-3,5-di-tert-butyl (revNap-BDP), were prepared in this study. According to the single crystal X-ray analysis, Nap-BDP exhibited an orthogonal structure. Owing to the difference in orthogonality and -tBu rotation between Nap-BDP and revNap-BDP, their spectral performances, including maximum absorption and emission, full width at half maximum, fluorescence quantum yield, photostability, singlet oxygen generation and photothermal conversion efficiency, were obviously different. The corresponding calculation results were in good agreement with the experimental results. Furthermore, the self-assembly of Nap-BDP nanoparticles could effectively promote cancer cell death by inducing singlet oxygen. Hence, this approach holds potential as a therapeutic strategy for enhancing cancer cell eradication via photodynamic therapy.

Disruption of Ferroptosis Inhibition and Immune Evasion with Tumor-Activatable Prodrug for Boosted Photodynamic/Chemotherapy Eradication of Drug-Resistant Tumors

Breast cancer is a malignant tumor that threatens the life and health of women worldwide. As the first-line chemotherapy drug for breast cancer, doxorubicin (DOX) can inhibit the synthesis of RNA and DNA, and it exhibits strong inhibitory activity against breast cancer. However, drug-induced systemic toxicity and drug resistance can occur with DOX treatment. In this work, TSPO protein is identified as a promising target for overcoming drug resistance and we designed a novel BT-DOX/PDP conjugate to solve these problems in drug chemotherapy. It is found that BT-DOX/PDP can effectively downregulate TSPO1 protein and sensitize MCF-7/Adr to DOX. Furthermore, due to its positive charge, BT-DOX/PDP is readily loaded into puerarin (PUE), the resulting BT-DOX/PDP@PUE exhibited minimal systemic toxicity but enhanced antitumor activity in animal models, as compared with BT-DOX/PDP. This study demonstrates the advantages of combined chemotherapy and photodynamic therapy in overcoming drug resistance, which may be applied in the design of other photodynamic therapy-based conjugates to enhance antitumor therapy.