NIR-light adsorbed nanoparticles combing the advantage of PAI and PTT (TNP-PAI/PTT) are expected to play a significant role in the dawning era of personalized medicine. However, the reported Au-, Ag-, Cu-, Co-, and other metal based, carbon-based TNP-PAI/PTT suffer from complex multicomponent system and poor biocompatibility and biodegradability. To overcome this limitation, biocompatible polydopamine nanoparticles (PDAs), structurally similar to naturally occurring melanin, were designed as both PA imaging contrast agent and a chemo-thermotherapy therapy agent for tumor. RGDC peptide modified PDAs can improve the PA imaging and PTT efficiency and specific targeted deliver doxorubicin (DOX) to perinuclear region of tumor cells. Our finding may help the development of PDA-based nanoplatform for PA imaging-directed synergistic therapy of tumor in clinic.

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Hypoxia‐activated prodrugs (HAPs) have the potential to selectively kill hypoxic cells and convert tumor hypoxia from a problem to a selective treatment advantage. However, HAPs are unsuccessful in most clinical trials owing to inadequate hypoxia within the treated tumors, as implied by a further substudy of a phase II clinical trial. Here, a novel strategy for the combination of HAPs plus vascular disrupting agent (VDA) nanomedicine for efficacious solid tumor therapy is developed. An effective VDA nanomedicine of poly(l‐glutamic acid)‐graft‐methoxy poly(ethylene glycol)/combretastatin A4 (CA4‐NPs) is prepared and can selectively enhance tumor hypoxia and boost a typical HAP tirapazamine (TPZ) therapy against metastatic 4T1 breast tumors. After treatment with the combination of TPZ plus CA4‐NPs, complete tumor reduction is observed in 4T1 xenograft mice (initial tumor volume is 180 mm3), and significant tumor shrinkage and antimetastatic effects are observed in challenging large tumors with initial volume of 500 mm3. The report here highlights the potential of using a combination of HAPs plus VDA nanomedicine in solid tumor therapy.

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Real-time and continuous monitoring of systemically administered agents is an important task in pharmaceutical development. Herein, we performed a real-time continuous study of the pharmacokinetics and biodistribution of indocyanine green (ICG) and liposomal indocyanine green (Lipo-ICG) in vivo by multispectral optoacoustic tomography (MSOT). By comparing the blood clearance and uptake behavior of these two ICG formulations in liver, spleen, kidney and tumor, we showed that Lipo-ICG prolonged the retention time of ICG in blood, and resulted in enhanced accumulation and retention in liver, spleen, and tumor. The results obtained from the MSOT test provided a comprehensive and continuous view of the metabolic behavior of the injected agents in different formulations. The results may also be helpful for understanding this new imaging technique.

A strategy for enhancing the treatment efficacy of nanomedicines within the central region of solid tumors is developed by combining nanomedicines and free small-molecule vascular disrupting agents (VDAs). The nanomedicines (cis-diamminedichloroplatinum-loaded nanoparticles) primarily target cells at the tumor periphery whereas the free small-molecule VDA (combretastatin A4 disodium phosphate) efficiently kills the cancer cells within the central regions of the tumor.