Copper/gold-modified porphyrinic metal-organic frameworks nanoprobes for enhanced photodynamic/chemodynamic therapy

Porphyrinic metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) had promising applications in the photodynamic therapy (PDT) and chemodynamic therapy (CDT) of cancers, but the insufficient reactive oxygen species restricted the efficacy. Herein, by coordinating Cu2+ and coating ultrasmall gold nanoparticles (AuNPs), a bi-functional porphyrinic MOFs (PCN-224) nanoplatform (PCN-224(Cu)-Au) was designed, achieving the dual-enhancement of PDT/CDT. The results indicated that the Cu2+ was doped in the core of porphyrin ring, and the singlet oxygen (1O2) generation increased from 79.9% to 85.7%, owing to the enhanced capture capability of photogenerated electrons by Cu2+. Using the glucose oxidase-like property of ultrasmall AuNPs, the produced hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) promoted the Fenton-like reaction of Cu+, by which the hydroxyl radicals (& BULL;OH) generation increased from 63.2% to 80.3%, exhibiting the enhanced CDT performance. Under the combination of enhanced PDT/CDT, the cell viability reduced to 9.1%, and the tumors disappeared completely, demonstrating the dual-enhancement effect of PCN-224(Cu)-Au nanoprobe.