title: Ultra-small BaGdF5-based upconversion nanoparticles as drug carriers and multimodal imaging probes.
abstract: A new type of drug-delivery system (DDS) was constructed, in which the anti-cancer drug doxorubicin (DOX) was conjugated to the ultra-small sized (sub-10 nm) BaGdF5:Yb(3+)/Tm(3+) based upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs). This multifunctional DDS simultaneously possesses drug delivery and optical/magnetic/X-ray computed tomography imaging capabilities. The DOX can be selectively released by cleavage of hydrazone bonds in acidic environment, which shows a pH-triggered drug release behavior. The MTT assay shows these DOX-conjugated UCNPs exhibit obvious cytotoxic effect on HeLa cells. Moreover, to improve the upconversion luminescence intensity, core-shell structured UCNPs were constructed. The in vitro upconversion luminescence images of these UCNPs uptaken by HeLa cells show bright emission with high contrast. In addition, these UCNPs were further explored for T1-weighted magnetic resonance (MR) and X-ray computed tomography (CT) imaging in vitro. Long-term in vivo toxicity studies indicated that mice intravenously injected with 10 mg/kg of UCNPs survived for 40 days without any apparent adverse effects to their health. The results indicate that this multifunctional drug-delivery system with optimized size, excellent optical/MR/CT trimodal imaging capabilities, and pH-triggered drug release property is expected to be a promising platform for simultaneous cancer therapy and bioimaging.
authors: State Key Laboratory of Rare Earth Resource Utilization, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, PR China.
authors: Dongmei
authors: D
authors: Yang
authors: State Key Laboratory of Rare Earth Resource Utilization, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, PR China.
authors: Yunlu
authors: Y
authors: Dai
authors: Department of Radiology, The Second Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun 130022, PR China.
authors: Jianhua
authors: J
authors: Liu
authors: College of Clinical Medicine, Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin 130012, PR China.
authors: Ying
authors: Y
authors: Zhou
authors: State Key Laboratory of Rare Earth Resource Utilization, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, PR China.
authors: Yinyin
authors: Y
authors: Chen
authors: State Key Laboratory of Rare Earth Resource Utilization, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, PR China.
authors: Chunxia
authors: C
authors: Li
authors: State Key Laboratory of Rare Earth Resource Utilization, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, PR China. Electronic address: mapa675@ciac.ac.cn.
authors: Ping'an
authors: P
authors: Ma
authors: State Key Laboratory of Rare Earth Resource Utilization, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, PR China. Electronic address: jlin@ciac.ac.cn.
authors: Jun
authors: J
authors: Lin
mesh_terms: D004317:Doxorubicin / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000737:chemistry; D004337:Drug Carriers / Q000737:chemistry*; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D006367:HeLa Cells; D006801:Humans; D064847:Multimodal Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D053758:Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry*; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed
chemical_list: D004337:Drug Carriers; D004317:Doxorubicin
keywords: BaGdF(5); Drug delivery; Multimodal imaging; Upconversion nanoparticle