Low-Temperature Trigger Nitric Oxide Nanogenerators for Enhanced Mild Photothermal Therapy
Chaoqun You, Yao‐Jia Li, Yixin Dong, Like Ning, Yu Zhang, Liyang Yao, Fei Wang
Abstract
Surmounting the restriction issues of nitric oxide (NO) delivery to realize their precious on-demand release is highly beneficial for the widespread deployment of gas therapy for application in biomedicine. Herein, by employing core–shell structure Au@SiO 2 nanomaterials with high photothermal performance, a novel strategy was proposed by integrating photothermal conversion nanomaterials and heat-triggered NO donors (RSNO) into a nanoplatform, which achieved photothermal therapy (PTT)-enhanced NO gas therapy under near-infrared (NIR) radiation. Specifically, 2-phenylethynesulfonamide (PES), an inhibitor of heat shock protein 70 (HSP-70), was loaded into the NO nanogenerators to realize effective low-temperature (∼45 °C) PTT. The obtained results showed that the near-infrared radiation (NIR) mediated mild PTT and gas therapy by releasing NO showed a substantially improved synergistic effect based on in vitro and in vivo results in breast cancer (MCF-7) models. Our study points out a strategy to realize mild photothermal therapy by inhibiting the expression of HSP-70 and simultaneously providing an avenue to achieve controllable release of NO. More important, this research highlights the great potential of multifunctional therapeutic agents in the synergistic treatment of cancer.