Ultrathin Cu₉S₅ Nanosheets with Sulfur Vacancy for Multimodal Tumor Therapy

Abstract

Multimodal tumor therapy with nanotechnology is an effective and integrative strategy to overcome the limitations of therapeutic efficacy and possible side effects associated with monotherapy. However, the construction of multimodal treatment nanoplatforms often involves various functional components, leading to certain challenges, such as time-consuming synthesis processes, low product yield, and inadequate biocompatibility. To address these issues, we have developed a straightforward method for preparing ultrathin Cu 9 S 5 nanosheets (NSs) with surface defects for photothermal/ photodynamic/chemodynamic therapy. The ultrathin morphology of the Cu 9 S 5 NSs (with 2−3 nm) not only confers excellent biocompatibility but also enables broad-spectrum absorption with a remarkable photothermal conversion efficiency (58.96%) under 1064 nm laser irradiation. Moreover, due to the presence of a S vacancy, these Cu 9 S 5 NSs exhibit favorable enzyme-like properties, including reactive oxygen species generation and glutathione consumption, particularly under laser irradiation. The efficacy of related tumor therapy and antibacterial treatment is significantly enhanced by the synergistic activation of photothermal/photodynamic/ chemodynamic therapy through 1064 nm laser irradiation, as demonstrated by both in vitro and in vivo experiments. This study presents a novel strategy for multimodal tumor therapy with the prepared ultrathin Cu 9 S 5 NSs, which holds promising pathways for photodynamic therapy in the NIR-II region.