Preparation Of Phycocyanin Functionalized Single-Walled Carbon Nanohorns Hybrid And Its Application In Near-Infrared Light-Mediated Cancer Phototheranostics

In recent years,single-wall carbon nanohorns(SWNHs)have received great attention in nearinfrared light-mediated phototherapy due to their unique physical and chemical properties.However,its poor water dispersibility,inevitable adsorption of plasma proteins,and their single therapeutic function limited its applications in biological systems.Phycocyanin(PC)is an ideal photosensitizer,which can generate reactive oxygen species(ROS)for photodynamic therapy under light irradiation.However,the application of phycocyanin is limited by its photoinstability.Herein,we prepared a PC-functionalized single-walled carbon nanohorns(PC@SWNHs)hybrid,where PC is used to preform a protein corona around the SWNHs through non-covalent interface interactions,and the PC@SWNHs nanohybrid was used in near-infrared light-mediated cancer phototheranostics.The specific research contents are as follows:Chapter one:The research progress of carbon nanohorns and phycocyanin on the structure,properties,functions and applications is briefly summarized,and the research progress of phototherapy(including photothermal therapy,photodynamic therapy and combination phototherapy)is introduced.Then the research significance of this work is proposed.Chapter two : We developed a new class of PC-functionalized SWNHs hybrid(PC@SWNHs),where PC is used to achieve preformation of a protein corona around the SWNHs through non-covalent interface interactions.The physical and chemical properties of PC@SWNHs were characterized by TEM,UV–Vis spectroscopy,Raman spectroscopy and fluorescence spectra.Then the photothermal properties of PC@SWNHs and mechanisms of ROS generation were further studied.The obtained results will provide a new route to develop multifunctional carbon nanomaterial-based theranostic nanoplatforms for biomedical applications.Chapter three:PC is used to achieve preformation of a protein corona around the SWNHs through non-covalent interface interactions.The preformed PC protein corona can effectively improve the water dispersibility of SWNHs and protect them from plasma protein adsorption,while excellent ROS generiation capacity of PC make up the shortcomings of SWNHs.SWNHs give a PTT function to the nanohybrid,and excellent combined phototherapy effects were studied by MTT assay and dead/live cell staining.In addition to the multifunctional near-infrared-mediated cancer PTT/PDT,PC@SWNHs acts as an imaging agent for in vivo thermal imaging and photoacoustic imaging.Therefore,this work provides a new strategy to develop multifunctional carbon nanomaterial-based theranostic platforms for biomedical applications by using the complementarity between carbon nanomaterials and proteins.