NIR light-induced tumor phototherapy using ICG delivery system based on platelet-membrane-camouflaged hollow bismuth selenide nanoparticles

Near-infrared (NIR) light-triggered photothermal therapy (PTT) is a promising treatment strategy for treating cancer. The combination of nanotechnology and NIR has been widely applied. However, the therapeutic efficacy of the drug-delivery system depends on their ability to avoid phagocytosis of endothelial system, cross the biological barriers, prolong circulation life, localize and rapidly release the therapeutic at target sites. In this work, we designed a platelet membrane (PM)-camouflaged hollow mesoporous bismuth selenide nanoparticles (BS NPs) loading with indocyanine green (ICG) (PM@BS-ICG NPs) to achieve the above advantages. PM-coating has active tumor-targeting ability which could prevent drug leakage and provide drug long circulation, causing drug delivery systems to accumulate in tumor sites effectively. Moreover, as a type of the photothermal sensitizers, BS NPs are used as the inner cores to improve ICG stability and are served as scaffolds to enhance the hardness of this drug delivery system. For one hand, the thermal vibration of BS NPs under NIR laser irradiation causes tumor inhibition through hyperthermia. For another hand, this hyperthermia process could damage PM and let ICG rapid release from PM@BS-ICG NPs. The in vitro and in vivo results showed that this biomimetic nano-drug delivery system exhibits obvious antitumor activity which has good application prospect.     

Chromatography of plasmid DNA

Liquid chromatography plays a central role in process-scale manufacturing of therapeutic plasmid DNA (pDNA) for gene therapy and DNA vaccination. Apart from its use as a preparative purification step, it is also very useful as an analytical tool to monitor and control pDNA quality during processing and in final formulations. This paper gives an overview of the use of pDNA chromatography. The specificity of pDNA purification and the consequent limitations to the performance of chromatography are described. Strategies currently used to overcome those limitations, as well as other possible solutions are presented. Applications of the different types of chromatography to the purification of therapeutic pDNA are reviewed, and the main advantages and disadvantages behind each technique highlighted.     

Progress on phthalocyanine-conjugated Ag and Au nanoparticles: Synthesis,characterization, and photo-physicochemical properties

Phthalocyanine (Pc) complexes are an important class of dyes with numerous (e.g., biological, photophysical, and analytical) applications. Among the methods used to improve the properties of these complexes, one should mention the introduction of different substituents, variation of the central metal ion, ligand exchange, and conjugation to nanomaterials (e.g., carbon-based nanomaterials and metal nanoparticles (NPs)). This work briefly reviews Pc complex conjugation to Ag and Au NPs, highlights the different NP shapes, and discusses the diversity of conjugation approaches. Moreover, the use of UV–Vis spectroscopy, powder X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, dynamic light scattering and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy to characterize Pc-NP hybrids is summarized. The effect of conjugation on Pc photo-physicochemical properties (fluorescence, singlet oxygen generation, triplet state formation, and optical limiting behavior) is discussed, and future perspectives for the synthesis and applications of new hybrids are provided.     

鼻咽癌患者治疗过程中头发微量元素的变化

对比了３０名健康人与１００名初诊、三个月后复诊及六个月后复诊的鼻咽癌患者头发中的１１种微量元素的含量。发现病人的锌（Ｚｎ）、铜（Ｃｕ）、锰（Ｍｎ）及钴（Ｃｏ）的含量都比健康人低，而病人的钛（Ｔｉ）及砷（Ａｓ）含量则偏高。但经过三至六个月电疗及化疗之后，这些元素的含量普遍与健康人差异变小，这似乎是成功治疗的一个反映。     

Photodynamic therapy based on organic small molecular fluorescent dyes

This review aims to provide a summary of the progress in organic small molecular fluorescent dyes for photodynamic therapy in recent years and it is classified according to the structures of dyes including cyanines, phthalocyanine, BODIPYs and other agents.     

四川地区宫颈癌组织HPV18和HPV45 E6基因突变分析

采用聚合酶链反应技术对四川地区2003~2004年收集的60例宫颈癌患者的癌组织DNA进行人乳头瘤病毒(HPV) E6基因扩增, 获得HPV18和45型E6基因. 序列分析发现, 18型三例E6基因有同样的两处同义突变; 45型两例E6基因发生突变, 一例有两处碱基突变, 另一例发生六处碱基突变, 其中两处涉及氨基酸变化, 均位于E6抗原决定簇区. HPV45型E6基因中134位c→t, 157位c→t, 259位g→t和341位t→c的碱基点突变未见报道. 另外， 该地区HPV18和45型突变株之间存在碱基互变,  它们之间的最小差异比野生型HPV18和HPV45之间的差异小4.05%, 该数值比在非洲发现的突变株的要小很多, 该结果支持HPV18和HPV45可能起源于非洲的观点.     

LyP-1 peptide-functionalized gold nanoprisms for SERRS imaging and tumor growth suppressing by PTT induced-hyperthermia

The gold nanoprisms (GNPs) have exhibited special plasmonic properties for biomedical applications because of their unique shapes and dimensions. Based on their optical performance, the NIR dye IR780 not only enabled the GNPs-based nanosystem as SERRS nanoparticles for Raman-encoded molecular imaging, but also enhanced the plasmonic photothermal property by laser irradiation. Meanwhile, the GNPs/IR780-Lyp-1 by introduction of tumor-homing peptide segment LyP-1, which presents high affinity to p32 protein, demonstrated the increased enrichment in tumor region and enhanced photothermal therapy efficacy.     

GeneMCL in microarray analysis

Accurately and reliably identifying the actual number of clusters present with a dataset of gene expression profiles, when no additional information on cluster structure is available, is a problem addressed by few algorithms. GeneMCL transforms microarray analysis data into a graph consisting of nodes connected by edges, where the nodes represent genes, and the edges represent the similarity in expression of those genes, as given by a proximity measurement. This measurement is taken to be the Pearson correlation coefficient combined with a local non-linear rescaling step. The resulting graph is input to the Markov Cluster (MCL) algorithm, which is an elegant, deterministic, non-specific and scalable method, which models stochastic flow through the graph. The algorithm is inherently affected by any cluster structure present, and rapidly decomposes a graph into cohesive clusters. The potential of the GeneMCL algorithm is demonstrated with a 5,730 gene subset (IGS) of the Van't Veer breast cancer database, for which the clusterings are shown to reflect underlying biological mechanisms.     

乳腺癌与血清微量元素关系的分析

经临床、病理、放射或CT检查确诊的22名乳腺癌患者。在放疗前后分析血清中Fe、Zn、Cu、Mn、Se、Cr、Co、Ni的含量。结果显示：1．乳腺癌患者与健康人比较Cu、Ni含量增加，而Fe、Zn含量减少；2．健康人锌与其他元素的比值与乳腺癌患者比较，Fe／Zn上升，而Cu／Zn下降；3．乳腺癌患者放疗后与放疗前比较，Zn、Fe、Se、Co含量降低，而Cu、Ni含量增加，因此放疗时要针对降低元素给予合理的补充。     

Photokilling Squamous Carcinoma Cells SCCVII with Ultrafine Particles of Selected Metal Oxides

The ability of ultrafine particles of TiO₂, WO₃ and iron-doped TiO₂ to kill cancer cells in the presence of UV irradiation was investigated. The best photokilling effect on carcinoma cells SCVII cultured in vitro showed iron-doped TiO₂ ultrafine particles synthesized by the sol-gel procedure with starting chemicals Ti(IV)-isopropoxide and anhydrous Fe(II)-acetate. It was found that a small particle size and high dispersity influenced citotoxicity and photocatalytic efficiency. The remarkable photokiling effect of highly iron-doped TiO₂ ultrafine particles (the molar ratio Fe/Ti = 0.136) in the presence of UV irradiation was observed. The influence of ultrafine metal oxide particles on the inhibition of cancer cell proliferation was measured using a ³H-thymidine incorporation test. The possible mechanism involved in the photokilling of carcinoma cells with ultrafine particles of selected metal oxides was discussed.