A Polymer Multicellular Nanoengager for Synergistic NIR‐II Photothermal Immunotherapy

Abstract

Cell‐membrane‐coated nanoparticles (CCNPs) that integrate the biophysiological advantages of cell membranes with the multifunctionalities of synthetic materials hold great promise in cancer immunotherapy. However, strategies have yet to be revealed to further improve their immunotherapeutic efficacy. Herein, a polymer multicellular nanoengager (SPNE) for synergistic second‐near‐infrared‐window (NIR‐II) photothermal immunotherapy is reported. The nanoengager consists of an NIR‐II absorbing polymer as the photothermal core, which is camouflaged with fused membranes derived from immunologically engineered tumor cells and dendritic cells (DCs) as the cancer vaccine shell. In association with the high accumulation in lymph nodes and tumors, the multicellular engagement ability of the SPNE enables effective cross‐interactions among tumor cells, DCs, and T cells, leading to augmented T cell activation relative to bare or tumor‐cell‐coated nanoparticles. Upon deep‐tissue penetrating NIR‐II photoirradiation, SPNE eradicates the tumor and induces immunogenic cell death, further eliciting anti‐tumor T cell immunity. Such a synergistic photothermal immunotherapeutic effect eventually inhibits tumor growth, prevents metastasis and procures immunological memory. Thus, this study presents a general cell‐membrane‐coating approach to develop photo‐immunotherapeutic agents for cancer therapy.

Unlocking the power of optical imaging in the second biological window: Structuring near‐infrared II materials from organic molecules to nanoparticles

“…Till date, several types of organic and inorganic NIR‐II fluorescence probes such as nanoparticle‐based systems, including SMD‐based organic nanoparticles (SMDNPs; Pu et al, 2016; Y. Sun, Qu, et al, 2016), QDs (Hong et al, 2012; Y. Zhang, Hong, et al, 2012), semiconducting polymer‐based nanoparticles (SPNPs; Hong, Zou, et al, 2014; C. Xu et al, 2021), RENPs (Kamimura et al, 2011), and SWCNTs (Welsher et al, 2009), have been extensively explored for NIR‐II fluorescence imaging. Among these, small organic molecule‐based probes are considered to be the most desirable and optimal candidates for translation to clinical applications because of their high biocompatibility, rapid metabolism and excretion, and quality control under the current good manufacturing practice conditions, well‐defined architecture, and tunable spectral properties (Brahma et al, 2016; Louie, 2010; D. Ray et al, 2013; R. Singha et al, 2013; Y.…”

Biomimetic phototherapy in cancer treatment: from synthesis to application

“…Notably, the surface modification of the cell membrane can endow NPs with the ability to actively target diseased tissues. So far, enormous efforts have been devoted to applying membrane materials for delivering phototherapy agents for enhanced anti-tumor treatment, such as RBC membrane (Pei et al, 2018 ; Liu et al, 2018a , b ; Shi et al, 2020 ), cancer cell membrane (Li et al, 2017 ; Wang et al, 2020a , b ), PLTM (Ma et al, 2021 ), macrophage membrane (Liu et al, 2021 ), phagocyte membrane (Hu et al, 2020 ), MDSC membrane (Zhang et al, 2020a , b ), and fused membranes (Xu et al, 2021 ).…”

“…As different cell membranes have different characteristics, their functions can be integrated by fuzing two or more types of cell membranes into a hybrid membrane. Xu et al ( 2021 ) reported a semiconducting polymer nanoengager (SPNE) for efficient NIR-II photothermal immunotherapy ( Figure 9 ). SPNE uses NIR-II absorption polymer (semiconducting polymer nanoparticles [SPNs]) as photothermal core and uses fusion membrane from immune engineering tumor cells and DCs as cancer vaccine shell.…”

“… Schematic illustration of SPNE for synergistic NIR-II photothermal immunotherapy. Copyright 2021, John Wiley and Sons (Xu et al, 2021 ). …”

Stimuli-Responsive Polymeric Nanoplatforms for Cancer Therapy

“…Polymer molecules could be spontaneously self-assembled into nanomaterials under hydrophobic or electrostatic adsorption interactions. The polymeric nanocarriers with the loading of therapeutic drugs and imaging agents are promising to overcome the biological barriers for the theranostics of cancer (Li and Pu, 2020;Xu et al, 2021). Within these polymeric nanoplatforms, the designed smart polymeric nanocarriers responsive to the special stimuli conditions of tumor microenvironment have shown excellent effects in diagnosing and treating cancer (Montero de Espinosa et al, 2017;.…”