The combination of light and photosensitizers for phototherapeutic interventions such as photodynamic therapy has transformed medicine and biology. However, the shallow penetration of light in tissues and the reliance on tissue oxygenation to generate cytotoxic radicals have limited the method to superficial or endoscope-accessible lesions. Here, we report a way to overcome these limitations by using Cerenkov radiation from radionuclides to activate an oxygen-independent nanophotosensitizer, titanium dioxide (TiO2). We show that administration of transferrin-coated TiO2 nanoparticles and clinical grade radionuclides in mice and co-localization in tumours resulted in either complete tumour remission or increased their median survival. Histological analysis of tumour sections showed selective destruction of cancerous cells and high numbers of tumour infiltrating lymphocytes, suggesting that both free radicals and the activation of the immune system mediated the destruction. Our results offer a way to harness low radiance-sensitive nanophotosensitizers to achieve depth-independent Cerenkov radiation-mediated therapy.

This first application of laser-activated CNTs as PT contrast antimicrobial agents demonstrated its great potential to cause irreparable damages to disease-causing pathogens as well as to detect the pathogens at single bacterium level. This unique integration of laser and nanotechnology may also be used for drinking water treatment, food processing, disinfection of medical instrumentation, and purification of grafts and implants. Furthermore, the significant ethanol-induced enhancement of bubble formation provides another unique possibility to improve the efficiency of selective nanophotothermolysis for treating cancers, wounds, and vascular legions.

Most cancer patients succumb to disseminated disease because conventional systemic therapies lack spatiotemporal control of their toxic effects in vivo, particularly in a complicated milieu such as bone marrow where progenitor stem cells reside. Here, we demonstrate the treatment of disseminated cancer by photoactivatable drugs using radiopharmaceuticals. An orthogonal-targeting strategy and a contact-facilitated nanomicelle technology enabled highly selective delivery and co-localization of titanocene and radiolabelled fluorodeoxyglucose in disseminated multiple myeloma cells. Selective ablation of the cancer cells was achieved without significant off-target toxicity to the resident stem cells. Genomic, proteomic and multimodal imaging analyses revealed that the downregulation of CD49d, one of the dimeric protein targets of the nanomicelles, caused therapy resistance in small clusters of cancer cells. Similar treatment of a highly metastatic breast cancer model using human serum albumin-titanocene formulation significantly inhibited cancer growth. This strategy expands the use of phototherapy for treating previously inaccessible metastatic disease.

Antibody-based proteomics is an enabling technology that has significant implications for cancer biomarker discovery, diagnostic screening, prognostic and pharmacodynamic evaluation of disease state, and targeted therapeutics. Quantum dot based fluoro-immunoconjugates possess promising features towards realization of this goal such as high photostability, brightness and multispectral tunability. However, current strategies to generate such conjugates are riddled with complications such as improper orientation of antigen binding sites of the antibody, aggregation and stability issues. We report a facile yet effective strategy to conjugate anti epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) antibody to quantum dots using copper-free click reaction, and compared them to similar constructs prepared using traditional strategies such as succinimidyl-4-(N-maleimidomethyl) cyclohexane-1-carboxylate (SMCC) and biotin-streptavidin schemes. The Fc and Fab regions of the conjugates retain their binding potential, compared to those generated through the traditional schemes. We further applied the conjugates in testing a novel microsphere array device designed to carry out sensitive detection of cancer biomarkers through fluoroimmunoassays. Using purified EGFR, we determined the limit of detection of the microscopy centric system to be 12.5 ng/ml. The biological assay, in silico, was successfully tested and validated by using tumor cell lysates, as well as human serum from breast cancer patients and the results were compared to normal serum. A pattern consistent with established clinical data was observed, which further validates the effectiveness of the developed conjugates and its successful implementation both in vitro as well as in silico fluoroimmunoassays. The results suggest the potential development of a high throughput in silico paradigm for predicting the class of patient cancer based on EGFR expression levels relative to normal reference levels in blood.