A Facile Strategy of Boosting Photothermal Conversion Efficiency through State Transformation for Cancer Therapy

Abstract

Improving photothermal conversion efficiency (PCE) is critical to facilitate therapeutic performance during photothermal therapy (PTT). However, current strategies of prompting PCE always involve complex synthesis or modification of photothermal agents, thereby significantly inhibiting the practical applications and fundamental understanding of photothermal conversion. A facile strategy is herein present for boosting PCE by transforming photothermal agents from aggregated state to dispersed state. Compared to aggregated state, the developed photothermal agents with semiconducting nature can rotate freely in dispersed state, which allows for an efficient nonradiative dissipation through twisted intramolecular charge transfer (TICT) effect, consequentially offering excellent photothermal performance. Noteworthy, the state transformation can be achieved by virtue of releasing photothermal molecules from nanoparticles on the basis of a pH‐responsive polymer nanocarrier, and the PCE is elevated from 43% to 60% upon changing the pH values from 7.4 to 5.0. Moreover, the nanoparticle disassembly and state transformation behaviors can also smoothly proceed in lysosome of cancer cells, demonstrating a distinct photothermal therapeutic performance for cancer ablation. It is hoped that this strategy of transforming state to boost PCE would be a new platform for practical applications of PTT technique.

Nanoscaled PAMAM Dendrimer Spacer Improved the Photothermal‒Photodynamic Treatment Efficiency of Photosensitizer‐Decorated Confeito‐Like Gold Nanoparticles for Cancer Therapy

“…The photothermal conversion efficiency for the samples was calculated using the formula reported by Li et al (Supporting Information). [86] Singlet oxygen generation by light-irradiated TCPP-PAMAM-confeito-AuNP and ZnPc1-PAMAM-confeito-AuNP conjugates was monitored using the molecular probe disodium, 9,10-anthracenedipropionic acid (ADPA). [87] ADPA was converted into endoperoxide by singlet oxygen.…”

Rationally Driven Drug Nonradiative Decay via a Label‐Free Polyprodrug Strategy to Renew Tumor Cascade Photothermal‐Chemotherapy

“…Taken together, these observations verified the proposal that DOX prodrug units in core of DPNs were self-quenched as well as reduction-responsive DOX release and concurrent fluorescence recovery were achieved at simulated tumor's reductive milieu. [57]…”

Rational design of a small organic photosensitizer for NIR-I imaging-guided synergistic photodynamic and photothermal therapy

“…The D-A-D compound TPA-BTZ was synthesized through a one-step Suzuki cross-coupling reaction. 43 The synthetic route and detailed structural characterization of TPA-BTZ including 1 H NMR, 13 C NMR, and MS are provided in the ESI (Fig. S1-S3 †).…”