Nanodroplet-Vaporization-Assisted Sonoporation for Highly Effective Delivery of Photothermal Treatment.
Sonoporation refers to the use of ultrasound and acoustic cavitation to temporarily enhance the permeability of cellular membranes so as to enhance the delivery efficiency of therapeutic agents into cells. Microbubble-based ultrasound contrast agents are often used to facilitate these cavitation effects. This study used nanodroplets to significantly enhance the effectiveness of sonoporation relative to using conventional microbubbles. Significant enhancements were demonstrated both in vitro and in vivo by using gold nanorods encapsulated in nanodroplets for implementing plasmonic photothermal therapy. Combined excitation by ultrasound and laser radiation is used to trigger the gold nanodroplets to induce a liquid-to-gas phase change, which induces cavitation effects that are three-to-fivefold stronger than when using conventional microbubbles. Enhanced cavitation also leads to significant enhancement of the sonoporation effects. Our in vivo results show that nanodroplet-vaporization-assisted sonoporation can increase the treatment temperature by more than 10 °C above that achieved by microbubble-based sonoporation.
National Taiwan University, Graduate Institute of Biomedical Electronics and Bioinformatics, Taipei 106, Taiwan.
Wei-Wen
WW
Liu
National Taiwan University, Graduate Institute of Biomedical Electronics and Bioinformatics, Taipei 106, Taiwan.
Shu-Wei
SW
Liu
National Taiwan University, Graduate Institute of Biomedical Electronics and Bioinformatics, Taipei 106, Taiwan.
Yu-Ren
YR
Liou
National Chung-Cheng University, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Chia-Yi 621, Taiwan.
Yu-Hsun
YH
Wu
National Chung-Cheng University, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Chia-Yi 621, Taiwan.
Ya-Chuen
YC
Yang
National Chung-Cheng University, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Chia-Yi 621, Taiwan.
Churng-Ren Chris
CR
Wang
National Taiwan University, Graduate Institute of Biomedical Electronics and Bioinformatics, Taipei 106, Taiwan.|National Taiwan University, Department of Electrical Engineering, Taipei 106, Taiwan.
Pai-Chi
PC
Li
D002463:Cell Membrane Permeability / Q000528:radiation effects; D002470:Cell Survival; D045423:Microbubbles; D053758:Nanoparticles; D036103:Nanotechnology; D013010:Sonication / Q000379:methods; D014835:Volatilization