Antigens and adjuvants are loaded onto various types of nanocarriers and presented to APCs for activation of an immune response.

Surgery represents the major option for treating most solid tumors. Despite continuous improvements in surgical techniques, cancer recurrence after surgical resection remains the most common cause of treatment failure. Here, we report cold atmospheric plasma (CAP)-mediated postsurgical cancer treatment, using a portable air-fed CAP (aCAP) device. The aCAP device we developed uses the local ambient air as the source gas to generate cold plasma discharge with only joule energy level electrical input, thus providing a device that is simple and highly tunable for a wide range of biomedical applications. We demonstrate that local aCAP treatment on residual tumor cells at the surgical cavities effectively induces cancer immunogenic cell death in situ and evokes strong T cell-mediated immune responses to combat the residual tumor cells. In both 4T1 breast tumor and B16F10 melanoma models, aCAP treatment after incomplete tumor resection contributes to inhibiting tumor growth and prolonging survival.

A microdevice that offers glucagon supplements in a safe, non-invasive, and glucose-responsive manner is ideal for avoiding fatal hypoglycemia consequences from insulin overdosage during daily diabetes treatment. However, mold-assisted microfabrication of biomedical materials or devices typically needs high-resolution laser ablation to scale down structural design. In addition, the majority of the polymeric drug delivery materials being used to fabricate devices are dissolvable or deformable in aqueous environments, which restricts washing-based cleaning and purification procedures post shape fixation. This study leverages the design flexibility of 3D printing-assisted mold casting and presents a shrinking microfabrication approach that allows subsequent washing procedures to remove toxic monomer residues during polymerization. The feasibility of this approach is demonstrated by developing a glucose-responsive transdermal glucagon microneedle patch through matrix volume change-mediated release kinetic control. Shown in the type 1 diabetic mouse model, this transdermal patch can reverse the occurrence of hypoglycemia while lowering the risk of monomer residue-induced irritation during treatment. Freeing from the restrain of molding resolution for microstructure design, this shrinking methodology further provides an insight into post-fabrication purifications of biomedical materials.