Engineering 2D Silicene‐Based Mesoporous Nanomedicine for In Vivo Near‐Infrared‐Triggered Analgesia

Abstract

The utilization of local anesthetics for postoperative analgesia represents an effective approach, but generally suffers from short half‐lives and brachychronic local neurotoxicity. A desirable anesthetic with controllable and sustainable drug‐releasing performance for adequate analgesia effect is highly required. In this work, the core/shell‐structured two‐dimenional (2D) silicene nanosheets coated with mesoporous silica layer (abbreviated as Silicene@MSNs) have been rationally constructed as localized drug‐delivery system in sciatic nerve block to achieve on‐demand release of loaded ropivacaine (RP) in mesoporous silica layer for local analgesia. Based on the specific photothermal performance of 2D silicene core, this local anesthesia system can be triggered by near‐infrared laser to release the loaded RP, resulting in on‐demand and long‐lasting regional anesthesia. The analgesia effect is assessed by pain behavior tests, which demonstrates that the RP‐loaded Silicene@MSNs core/shell nanosystem behaves almost five times longer analgesia effect than free RP. Furthermore, the activation of pain‐related neurons in nerve conduction pathways is tested to explore the underlying analgesia mechanism, revealing that the designed nanosystem can improve the pain threshold, reduce the activation of neurons in dorsal root ganglion and excitability in spinal substantia gelatinosa neurons. This designed anesthetic nanomedicine provides a facile but effective methodology for long‐lasting regional anesthesia.

Nucleolin recognizing silica nanoparticles inhibit cell proliferation by activating the Bax/Bcl-2/caspase-3 signalling pathway to induce apoptosis in liver cancer

“…Due to the complex environment in the body, natural products cannot be effectively delivered to the liver tumor site, which also limits their application. Drug delivery systems mediated by MSNs have demonstrated significant benefits in the targeted therapy, and more crucially, the logical design of MSNs allows for the simultaneous integration of numerous functionalities into a single platform for drug delivery ( Vallet-Regí et al, 2022 ; Yin et al, 2022 ), diagnosis ( Wang et al, 2021 ; Tang et al, 2022 ) and even combination therapy ( Wu et al, 2021b ; Li et al, 2021c ). For example, dual drug release from red light-triggered self-destructive MSNs boosted immunogenic cell death and strengthened antitumor immunity responses ( Yang et al, 2022 ).…”

Silicon-containing nanomedicine and biomaterials: materials chemistry, multi-dimensional design, and biomedical application

“…In a recent work, silicene@MS loaded with the anesthetic drug ropivacaine (RP) was employed as a local anesthesia delivery system to prolong the drug release period. 1063 With a sustained release manner, the RP-loaded silicene@MS provided an analgesic effect lasting nearly five-times longer than free RP. Silicene nanosheets have also been utilized as efficient vectors for the delivery of macromolecules.…”

Novel silicene-mesoporous silica nanoparticles conjugated gemcitabine induced cellular apoptosis via upregulating NF-κB p65 nuclear translocation suppresses pancreatic cancer growth in vitro and in vivo

“…The silicene nanosheets (SN) and silicene-MSN (SMSN) nanoparticles were synthesized according to the published literature [26][27][28][29]. Briefly, 20 mg of Gemcitabine was added to the prepared SMSN solution (5 ml, 1 mg ml −1 ), stirred, dispersed, and after 12 h of adsorption, the SMSN-G nanodrug was collected by centrifugation.…”