Theranostics 2016; 6(10):1703-1716. doi:10.7150/thno.15647 This issue Cite
Research Paper
1. School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Metal Matrix Composites, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 800 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai, 200240, P. R. China.
2. Department of Physics and Shanghai Key Laboratory of Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, East China Normal University, North Zhongshan Road 3663, Shanghai, 200062, P. R. China.
3. Jiangsu Collaborative Innovation Center of Biomedical Functional Materials, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Biomedical Materials, College of Chemistry and Materials Science, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, 210046, P. R. China.
*Equal contribution.
Nano drug delivery systems have emerged as promising candidates for cancer therapy, whereas their uncertainly complete elimination from the body within specific timescales restricts their clinical translation. Compared with hepatic clearance of nanoparticles, renal excretion of small molecules is preferred to minimize the agent-induced toxicity. Herein, we construct in vivo renal-clearable nanoparticles, which are self-assembled from amphiphilic small molecules holding the capabilities of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and chemotherapy. The assembled nanoparticles can accumulate in tumor tissues for their nano-characteristics, while the small molecules dismantled from the nanoparticles can be efficiently cleared by kidneys. The renal-clearable nanoparticles exhibit excellent tumor-inhibition performance as well as low side effects and negligible chronic toxicity. These results demonstrate a potential strategy for small molecular nano drug delivery systems with obvious anticancer effect and low-toxic metabolism pathway for clinical applications.
Keywords: nanodrug delivery, small molecular nanoparticle, cancer therapy, renal clearance, MRI