Abstract

Photo-induced cancer therapies, mainly including photothermal therapy (PTT) and photodynamic therapy (PDT), have attracted numerous attentions owing to the high selectivity, convenience, and few side effects. However, single PTT usually requires high laser power density, and single PDT usually needs a high photosensitizer dosage. Herein, a kind of composite nanocarrier based on clay (laponite)-polypyrrole (LP) nanodisks were synthesized, via the in situ polymerization of pyrrole (Py) in the inter-layer space of laponite. LP composite nanodisks were then coated with polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) to form the LP-PVP (LPP) composite nanodisks, which show an excellent colloidal stability, in vitro and in vivo biocompatibility. The inter-layer space of LPP can be further used for the loading of Chlorin e6 (Ce6), with an ultra-high loading capacity of about 89.2%. Furthermore, the LPP nanocarrier can enhance the PDT effect of Ce6 (under the irradiation of 660 nm laser), through enhancing its solubility and cellular uptake amount. Besides, it was found that LPP nanodisks exhibit a more outstanding photothermal performance under 980 nm than 808 nm near-infrared (NIR) laser, with the photothermal conversion efficiency of 45.7% and 27.7%, respectively. The in vitro and in vivo tumor therapy results evidently confirm that the Ce6 loaded LPP nanodisks have a combined tumor PTT and PDT effect, which can significantly suppress the tumor malignant proliferation.