On-demand
drug release nanoplatforms are promising alternative
strategies for enhancing the therapeutic effect of cancer chemotherapy.
However, these nanoplatforms still have many drawbacks including rapid
blood clearance, nontargeted specificity, and a lack of immune escape
function. Even worse, they are also hindered via the
dosage-limiting toxicity of traditional chemotherapeutic drugs. Herein,
both dual-functional mannose (enhances the antitumor activity of chemotherapeutic
drugs and exhibits an innate affinity against the lectin receptor)
and amphiphilic d-α-tocopheryl polyethylene glycol
1000 succinate were selected to be covalently linked via a redox-responsive monothioether linkage. The synthesized self-distinguished
polymer (TSM), as a structural motif, can be self-assembled into nanoparticles
(TSM NPs) in an aqueous solution, in which doxorubicin (DOX) is loaded
by weak interactions (TSM–DOX NPs). These TSM–DOX NPs
can provide targeted, on-demand drug release under dual stimuli from
lysosomal acidity and glutathione (GSH). In addition, TSM–DOX
NPs can be self-distinguished via tumor cells in vitro and specifically self-distinguished from the tumor
site in vivo. Further in vitro and in vivo research consistently demonstrated that TSM–DOX
NPs display highly synergistic chemotherapeutic effects. Taken together,
the data show that the self-distinguished GSH-responsive polymer TSM
has the potential to load various therapeutic agents.