Biodegradable mesoporous Co3O4 based nanocarriers with intrinsic lung carcinoma suppression for NIR II fluorescence bioimaging and photothermal augmented photodynamic therapy

As the highest prevalence and mortality, malignant lung carcinoma is still regarded to be an unabating cancer until now. Besides, mesoporous nanocarrier-based therapeutics delivery system has drawn plenty of attention and Co3O4 nanoparticles have been demonstrated intrinsic Fenton-like activity which is much higher than analogous synthesized Fe3O4. In this work, in order to precisely diagnose and effectively eliminate lung tumor cells, we have synthesized mesoporous hollowed Co3O4 nanocarriers with ICG loading and surface grafting of RGD peptides. We have demonstrated that the biodegradable nanoplatform is a promising NIR II fluorescent contrast agent for accurately delineating tumor counters and phototheranostic agent with photo-heat conversion efficiency as ∼59.93% under 808 nm light exposure. More importantly, the corresponded hyperthymia progressively potentiates the ROS production via Co ions catalyzation. Our Co-based nanocomposite could efficaciously suppress the tumorigenesis both in vitro and in vivo accompanied by 808 nm laser illumination. In summary, all data highlights the potency of biodegradable Co-based mesoporous nanocarriers as contrast agents for multimodal imaging and photothermal augmented ROS amplification for efficient lung tumor inhibition.