Lecithin sensitized thermo-sensitive niosome using NIR-carbon dots for breast cancer combined chemo-photothermal therapy

In this work, a new class of thermo-sensitive niosome (TS-Nio) was synthesized using lecithin and NIR-carbon dots, for combined chemo-photothermal therapy. TS-Nio (200 nm) and noisome (240 nm) were synthesized using thin layer method and were stable for 14 days in water, buffer, and cellular environment. CQDs with a hydrodynamic diameter of 2.0 ± 0.5 nm (during 14 days) were synthesized by the hydrothermal method, and their photothermal, and quantum efficiency were 24.3% and 67%, respectively. Synthesized CQDs had repeating maximum temperature of 55 ± 0.2 °C in four 10-min irradiation cycles (LASER 808 nm) and photothermal therapy effect of 40%, 46%, 44%, and 48% for MCF-10A, MCF-7, MDA-MB-231, SKBR-3 cells, respectively. Drug and CQDs were loaded in the niosomes, and the release difference between normal and cancer cell conditions were 55% and 21% for TS-Nio and niosome, respectively. The drug release kinetic model was Komsmeyer & Peppas. Chemotherapy on MCF-7 cancer cells using Dox-loaded niosomes showed the maximum toxicity of 46% and 37% for TS-Nio and niosome, respectively. The chemophotothermal therapy on MCF-10A, MCF-7, MDA-MB-231, SKBR-3 cells using drug and CQDs loaded niosomes with 10 min laser irradiation were 40%, 88%, 89%, 15% for TS-Nio, and 17%, 61%, 67%, 29% for niosome respectively. The results showed perfect targeting and effective chemophotothermal therapy of TS-Nio on MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231 cell lines.