Xing Ma, Qiuyu Qu, Yanli Zhao
May 15, 2015
Citations
2
Influential Citations
113
Citations
Quality indicators
Journal
ACS applied materials & interfaces
Abstract
5-Aminolevulinic acid (5-ALA) is a precursor of a strong photosensitizer, protoporphyrin IX (PphIX), for photodynamic therapy (PDT). Developing appropriate delivery carriers that can assist 5-ALA in bypassing the lipophilic barrier to directly enter into cancer cells is a research focus. The improved delivery of 5-ALA is even important for skin cancer therapy through PDT process. In this work, targeting ligand folic acid (FA)-functionalized hollow mesoporous silica nanoparticles (HMSNPs) were fabricated to deliver 5-ALA for PDT against B16F10 skin cancer cells. The FA targeting ligand enabled selective endocytosis of 5-ALA loaded HMSNPs into cancer cells. PphIX formed from delivered 5-ALA exhibited high photocytotoxicity to the cancer cells in vitro.