Photothermal supramolecular vesicles coassembled from pillar[5]arene and aniline tetramer for tumor eradication in NIR-I and NIR-II biowindows

Smart nanocarriers which can respond to the environmental changes have becoming an intriguing topic for the chemical therapy of cancer in the last years. Apart from the traditional chemical treatment, novel therapeutic methods, in particular photothermal therapy (PTT) also have been extensively investigated to optimize the treatment efficacy. However, the chemo-photothermal synergistic therapy, especially drug nanocarriers which display strong absorption in NIR-II region have been rarely reported. Herein, the host-guest interaction between water-soluble pillar[5]arene (WP5) and aniline tetramer (TANI) was investigated and the WP5 superset of TANI complex could construct supramolecular vesicles via self-assembly. Interestingly, the WP5 superset of TANI supramolecular vesicles were compatible with normal cells yet toxic to cancer cells. Moreover, the supramolecular vesicles reported here revealed high encapsulation efficiency for the anticancer drug doxorubicin (DOX) and the DOX releasing could be triggered by either the acidic microenvironment of the tumor site or photothermal effect. In particular, the PTT employing NIR-II region could be applied, which completely eradicated the tumor as confirmed by the in vivo experiments. Therefore, the WP5 superset of TANI supramolecular photothermal vesicles reported here suggested their great promise in the application for cancer treatment.

Automated summary

The host-guest interaction between water-soluble pillar[5]arene and aniline tetramer was studied, resulting in the construction of supramolecular vesicles with selective toxicity to cancer cells and high encapsulation efficiency for anticancer drugs. Photothermal therapy utilizing NIR-II region showed promising results in completely eradicating tumors.