A fullerene-based multi-functional nanoplatform for cancer theranostic applications

Recently, nanomaterials with multiple functions, such as drug carrier, MRI and optical imaging, photothermal therapy etc, have become more and more popular in the domain of cancer research. In this study, a C60–IONP nanocomposite is synthesized via decorating iron oxide nanoparticles (IONP) onto fullerene (C60) and then functionalized by polyethylene glycol (PEG2000), giving C60–IONP–PEG with excellent stability in physiological solutions, finally folic acid (FA), a widely used tumor targeting molecule, was linked to C60–IONP–PEG in order to obtain an active tumor targeting effect to MCF-7 cells and malignant tumor in mice models. Herein, a hybrid nanoplatform with multi-functional characteristics for cancer diagnosis, photodynamic therapy (PDT), radiofrequency (RF) thermal therapy (RTT) and magnetic targeting applications was developed and explored its biofunctions in vitro and in vivo. C60–IONP–PEG–FA showed neglectable toxicity, not only served as a powerful tumor diagnostic magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) contrast agent, but also as a strong photosensitizer and powerful agent for photothermal ablation of tumor, furthermore a remarkable synergistic enhancement of PDT combination with RTT was also observed during the treatment both in vitro and in vivo. Moreover, the multi-functional nanoplatform also could selectively kill cancer cells in highly localized regions via the excellent active tumor targeting and magnetic targeted abilities. This work showed the multi-functional C60–IONP–PEG–FA nanoplatform had a great potential for cancer theranostic applications.