Secure transplantation by tissue purging using photodynamic therapy to eradicate malignant cells

De novo design of a nanoregulator for the dynamic restoration of ovarian tissue in cryopreservation and transplantation

The cryopreservation and transplantation of ovarian tissue underscore its paramount importance in safeguarding reproductive capacity and ameliorating reproductive disorders. However, challenges persist in ovarian tissue cryopreservation and transplantation (OTC-T), including the risk of tissue damage and dysfunction. Consequently, there has been a compelling exploration into the realm of nanoregulators to refine and enhance these procedures. This review embarks on a meticulous examination of the intricate anatomical structure of the ovary and its microenvironment, thereby establishing a robust groundwork for the development of nanomodulators. It systematically categorizes nanoregulators and delves deeply into their functions and mechanisms, meticulously tailored for optimizing ovarian tissue cryopreservation and transplantation. Furthermore, the review imparts valuable insights into the practical applications and obstacles encountered in clinical settings associated with OTC-T. Moreover, the review advocates for the utilization of microbially derived nanomodulators as a potent therapeutic intervention in ovarian tissue cryopreservation. The progression of these approaches holds the promise of seamlessly integrating nanoregulators into OTC-T practices, thereby heralding a new era of expansive applications and auspicious prospects in this pivotal domain.

Liposomal oxygen-generating hydrogel for enhancing cell survival under hypoxia condition

The inadequate oxygen supply to engineered tissues has been a persistent challenge in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. To overcome this limitation, we developed a scaffold combined with an oxygen-releasing liposomal system comprising catalase-loaded liposomes (CAT@Lip) and H2O2-loaded liposomes (H2O2@Lip). This oxygenation system has shown high cytocompatibility when they were applied to human stromal cells. Under hypoxic conditions, the cell viability enclosed in the oxygen-releasing liposomal alginate hydrogel (94.62 ± 3.46 %) was significantly higher than that of cells enclosed in hydrogel without liposomes (47.18 ± 9.68 %). There was no significant difference in cell viability and apoptosis rate compared to normoxia conditions after three days, indicating the effectiveness of the oxygen-releasing approach in hypoxic conditions. In conclusion, our study demonstrates that the use of liposomal oxygen-releasing scaffolds can overcome the oxygen diffusion challenge in tissue implant fabrication, providing a simple solution for cellular oxygenation that could be a crucial element in tissue engineering.

Methylene blue in anticancer photodynamic therapy: systematic review of preclinical studies

Background: Methylene blue has a long history of clinical application. Thanks to phenothiazine chromophore, it has potential in photodynamic anticancer therapy. In spite of the growing body of literature that has evaluated the action of this dye on different types of cancer, the systematic understanding of this problem is still lacking. Therefore, this systematic review was performed to study the efficacy of methylene blue in photodynamic anticancer therapy. Methods: This systematic review was carried out in accordance with the PRISMA guidelines, and the study protocol was registered in PROSPERO (CRD42022368738). Articles for the systematic review were identified through the PubMed database. SYRCLE's risk of bias tool was used to assess the studies. The results of systematic analysis are presented as narrative synthesis. Results: Ten studies met the inclusion criteria and these full texts were reviewed. In the selected articles, the dosage of dye infusion ranged from 0.04 to 24.12 mg/kg. The effectiveness of photodynamic therapy with methylene blue against different types of cancer was confirmed by a decrease in tumor sizes in seven articles. Conclusion: The results of the systematic review support the suggestions that photodynamic therapy with methylene blue helps against different types of cancer, including colorectal tumor, carcinoma, and melanoma. In cases of nanopharmaceutics use, a considerable increase of anticancer therapy effectiveness was observed. The further research into methylene blue in photodynamic anticancer therapy is needed. Systematic Review Registration: (https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?RecordID=368738), identifier (CRD42022368738).

Research progress of potential factors influencing photodynamic therapy for gastrointestinal cancer

Gastrointestinal cancer is a malignant tumor of the gastrointestinal tract and its associated digestive organs, including esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, carcinoma of the ampulla, pancreas, bile duct, intestines and rectal cancer. They account for about 30% of global cancer-related incidence and about 40% of mortality. Photodynamic therapy (PDT), as a treatment mode, has been applied to the treatment of gastrointestinal cancer due to potential advantages targeting and potentially lower toxic side effects. However, In the course of clinical treatment, we have found that different patients have various responsiveness to PDT, and even the same patients may have different clinical effects after receiving treatment in different time periods. For influencing factors, traditionally, we only focus on adjusting the dose of photosensitizer and the intensity and time of irradiation,while minimizing other potential factors.Therefore, this paper looks for factors that affect PDT from the patient's own conditions, tumor characteristics and tumor microenvironment(including:tumor acidic microenvironment,tumor hypoxic microenvironment, multi-drug resistance, different tumor characteristics and the immune status of patients) and summarizes how to potentially improve the curative effect of PDT.

Photodynamic therapy using OR141-loaded nanovesicles for eradication of leukemic cells from ovarian tissue

In 2020, the estimated number of new leukemia cases was higher than 30,000 in girls between 0 and 19 years old. Due to cancer treatment, some of these patients may lose both endocrine and reproductive functions. Transplantation of cryopreserved ovarian tissue is not advised after cancer remission because it has a high risk of reintroducing malignant cells in the patient, potentially leading to leukemia recurrence. To safely transplant the ovarian tissue from these patients and restore their fertility, our goal was to develop a photodynamic therapy (PDT) strategy to eliminate leukemia ex vivo. To this end, we designed, optimized, and characterized OR141-loaded niosomes (ORN) to develop the most effective formulation for ex vivo purging ovarian fragments from chronic myelogenous leukemia cells. After establishing the best ORN formulation, the PDT efficiency of optimized ORN was determined for human ovarian stromal cells and acute myeloid leukemia cell line (HL60). Blank niosomes treatment on ovarian stromal cells causes no significant toxicity, showing that the composition of the nanoparticle is not toxic. On the other hand, the in vitro studies showed that while ovarian stromal cells were still viable (82.04 ± 2.79%) after the treatment by 0.5 µM ORN, the same treatment yielded 95.43 ± 3.89% toxicity and cell death in the cancer cells. In conclusion, our results showed that our novel PDT procedure could be a promising strategy to destroy leukemia cells in ovarian tissue fragments allowing safe transplantation in cancer survivors.

Nanoemulsion applications in photodynamic therapy

Nanoemulsion, or nanoscaled-size emulsions, is a thermodynamically stable system formed by blending two immiscible liquids, blended with an emulsifying agent to produce a single phase. Nanoemulsion science has advanced rapidly in recent years, and it has opened up new opportunities in a variety of fields, including pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, food, and cosmetics. Nanoemulsion has been recognized as a potential drug delivery technology for various drugs, such as photosensitizing agents (PS). In photodynamic therapy (PDT), PSs produce cytotoxic reactive oxygen species under specific light irradiation, which oxidize the surrounding tissues. Over the past decades, the idea of PS-loaded nanoemulsions has received researchers' attention due to their ability to overcome several limitations of common PSs, such as limited permeability, non-specific phototoxicity, hydrophobicity, low bioavailability, and self-aggregation tendency. This review aims to provide fundamental knowledge of nanoemulsion formulations and the principles of PDT. It also discusses nanoemulsion-based PDT strategies and examines nanoemulsion advantages for PDT, highlighting future possibilities for nanoemulsion use.

Novel Short PEG Chain-Substituted Porphyrins: Synthesis, Photochemistry, and In Vitro Photodynamic Activity against Cancer Cells

This work presents the synthesis and characterization of metal-free, zinc (II), and cobalt (II) porphyrins substituted with short PEG chains. The synthesized compounds were characterized by UV-Vis, ¹H and ¹³C NMR spectroscopy, and MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry. The origin of the absorption bands for tested compounds in the UV-Vis range was determined using a computational model based on the electron density functional theory (DFT) and its time-dependent variant (TD-DFT). The photosensitizing activity was evaluated by measuring the ability to generate singlet oxygen (ΦΔ), which reached values up to 0.54. The photodynamic activity was tested using bladder (5637), prostate (LNCaP), and melanoma (A375) cancer cell lines. In vitro experiments clearly showed the structure-activity relationship regarding types of substituents, their positions in the phenyl ring, and the variety of central metal ions on the porphyrin core. Notably, the metal-free derivative 3 and its zinc derivative 6 exerted strong cytotoxic activity toward 5637 cells, with IC₅₀ values of 8 and 15 nM, respectively. None of the tested compounds induced a cytotoxic effect without irradiation. In conclusion, these results highlight the potential value of the tested compounds for PDT application.