Synergistic therapeutic strategies for
bacterial infection have attracted extensive attentions owing to their
enhanced therapeutic effects and less adverse effects compared with
monotherapy. Herein, we report a novel synergistic antibacterial platform
that integrates the nanocatalytic antibacterial therapy and photothermal
therapy (PTT) by hemoglobin-functionalized copper ferrite nanoparticles
(Hb-CFNPs). In the presence of a low concentration of hydrogen peroxide
(H2O2), the excellent Fenton and Fenton-like
reaction activity of Hb-CFNPs can effectively catalyze the decomposition
of H2O2 to produce hydroxyl radicals (·OH),
rendering an increase in the permeability of the bacterial cell membrane
and the sensitivity to heat. With the assistance of NIR irradiation,
hyperthermia generated by Hb-CFNPs can induce the death of the damaged
bacteria. Additionally, owing to the outstanding magnetic property
of Hb-CFNPs, it can improve the photothermal efficiency by about 20
times via magnetic enrichment, which facilitates to realize excellent
bactericidal efficacy at a very low experimental dose (20 μg/mL).
In vitro antibacterial experiment shows that this synergistic antibacterial
strategy has a broad-spectrum antibacterial property against Gram-negative Escherichia coli (E. coli, 100%) and Gram-positive Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus, 96.4%). More importantly,
in vivo S. aureus-infected abscess
treatment studies indicate that Hb-CFNPs can serve as an antibacterial
candidate with negligible toxicity to realize synergistic treatment
of bacterial infections through catalytic and photothermal effects.
Accordingly, this study proposes a novel, high-efficiency, and multifunctional
therapeutic system for the treatment of bacterial infection, which
will open up a new avenue for the design of synergistic antibacterial
systems in the future.
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