Acid-Sensitive Nanogels for Synergistic Chemo-Photodynamic Therapy.

Herein, a novel kind of intelligent nanogels have been designed, which can spatiotemporally control the release of drug (doxorubicin) and photosensitizers (porphyrins) to combine chemo-therapy and photodynamic therapy. Further, the fluorescing properties of porphyrins make it possible to be used as a kind of diagnostic bio-imaging agents. In vitro release assays confirm that DOX-loaded nanogels show obvious intracellular pH-sensitive property. The intracellular experiments further prove that drug-loaded nanogels has the significantly antitumor efficacy due to the combination of chemotherapy and photodynamic therapy, which made this drug delivery system hold great potential applications for further cancer treatment.