Responsive drug release and low toxicity of drug carriers
are important
for designing controlled release systems. Here, a double functional
diffractive o-nitrobenzyl, containing multiple electron-donating
groups as a crosslinker and methacrylic acid (MAA) as a monomer, was
used to decorate upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs) to produce robust
poly o-nitrobenzyl@UCNP nanocapsules using the distillation-precipitation
polymerization and templating method. Poly o-nitrobenzyl@UCNP
nanocapsules with a robust yolk–shell structure exhibited near-infrared
(NIR) light-/pH-responsive properties. When the nanocapsules were
exposed to 980 nm NIR irradiation, the loaded drug was efficiently
released by altering the shell of the nanocapsules. The photodegradation
kinetics of the poly o-nitrobenzyl@UCNP nanocapsules
were studied. The anticancer drug, doxorubicin hydrochloride (DOX),
was loaded at pH 8.0 with a loading efficiency of 13.2 wt %. The Baker–Lonsdale
model was used to determine the diffusion coefficients under different
release conditions to facilitate the design of dual-responsive drug
release devices or systems. Additionally, cytotoxicity studies showed
that the drug release of DOX could be efficiently triggered by NIR
to kill cancer cells in a controlled manner.
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