Highly Biocompatible Carbon Nanodots for Simultaneous Bioimaging and Targeted Photodynamic Therapy In Vitro and In Vivo

Abstract

Photosensitizers (PSs) are light‐sensitive molecules that are highly hydrophobic, which poses a challenge to their use for targeted photodynamic therapy. Hence, considerable efforts have been made to develop carriers for the delivery of PSs. Herein, a novel design is described of highly biocompatible, fluorescent, folic acid (FA)‐functionalized carbon nanodots (CDs) as carriers for the PS zinc phthalocyanine (ZnPc) to achieve simultaneous biological imaging and targeted photodynamic therapy. FA is modified on PEG‐­passivated CDs (CD‐PEG) for targeted delivery to FA‐positive cancer cells, and ZnPc is loaded onto CD‐PEG‐FA via π–π stacking interactions. CD‐PEG‐FA/ZnPc exhibits excellent targeted delivery of the PS, leading to simultaneous imaging and significant targeted photodynamic therapy after irradiation in vitro and in vivo. The present CD‐based targeted delivery of PSs is anticipated to offer a convenient and effective platform for enhanced photodynamic therapy to treat cancers in the near future.

Revisiting the classification of NIR-absorbing/emitting nanomaterials for in vivo bioapplications

“…In fact, Choi et al 218 demonstrated that the ZnPc PSs-capped C-dot composite could be used for dual color bioimaging (λem = 461 nm and λex = 358 nm for C-dots and λem = 665 nm and λex = 647 nm for ZnPc) and ZnPc-assisted PDT (10 min with a 660 nm laser at 30 mW cm − 2 ). By introducing the two-photon process, a singlewavelength excitation could simultaneously induce deep tissue optical imaging, pH sensing and PDT.…”

Nitrogen and sulfur co-doped carbon dots for highly selective and sensitive detection of Hg (Ⅱ) ions

“…As results, C-dots has found wide potential applications, including bioimaging or biosensors (Cao et al, 2007;Yang et al, 2009;Wang et al, 2010;Kong et al, 2012;Shi et al, 2012;Zhu et al, 2012;Sun et al, 2014;Liu, Y., et al, 2014;Wang and Zhou, 2014), drug delivery Karthik et al, 2013;Choi et al, 2014;Zheng et al, 2014), electrochemical/electrochemiluminescence catalysis/sensing (Liu and Chen, 2013;Yang et al, 2013;Long et al, 2014), energy conversion (Li et al, 2010;Tang et al, 2012;Zhang, H., et al, 2012), photocatalysis, and optoelectronics (Li, H., et al, 2012). In the field of FL sensor applications, however, critical challenges remain for C-dots, particularly in terms of the low fluorescence quantum yields (FLQY), as well as relatively poor probe sensitivity and selectivity.…”

Fluorescence characteristics of carbon nanoemitters derived from sucrose by green hydrothermal and microwave methods

“…Unique properties and potential applications of fluorescent CNPs in the fields such as sensing, bioimaging and drug delivery have attracted significant attention over the recent years [8,9]. Benign nature of fluorescent CNPs is one of their most interesting and enjoyable property [10,11]. There are two main types of approaches for preparation of fluorescent CNPs i.e.…”