Synthesis of a new photosensitizer for photodynamic and photothermal synergistic cancer therapy

Abstract

Semiconducting compounds have tremendous potential for phototherapeutic treatment of cancer, owing to their high reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation ability and photothermal conversion efficiency. In this paper, we report a newly synthesized photosensitizer, PDIDPP for the treatment of human colon (HCT-116) and Uppsala 87 malignant glioma (U87MG) cancer cells. Nanoparticles (NPs) with uniform size were synthesized by encapsulating DSPE-PEG_-2000 (1,2-distearoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphoethanolamine-N-[methoxy(polyethylene glycol)_-2000] onto the surface of PDIDPP. Such NPs show outstanding ROS generation ability and photothermal conversion efficiency (32.6%) with light irradiation. In vitro investigation indicates that these NPs can be uptaken by U87MG and HeLa cells and considerable phototoxicity was observed with irradiation, while the dark toxicity was negligible. Further in vivo study showed that tumor proliferation was completely inhibited with the help of a laser, while the normal organs suffered from no adverse effects. These results suggest that PDIDPP NPs may be potential candidates for cancer phototheranostics.