Porous silica-based platform bearing Au/Ag nanosheets for targeted combination therapy and fluorescence imaging

A versatile delivery platform combining gold-coated silver triangular nanosheets (Ag@Au NSs) and silver sulfide (Ag2S) quantum dots (QDs) embedded porous silica (Ag2S/pSiO2) carriers was developed for combination therapy and fluorescence imaging. The Ag@Au NSs exhibited excellent biocompatibility and photothermal efficiency. After combining the Ag2S/pSiO2 carriers with Ag@Au NSs (Ag2S/pSiO2/Ag@Au), a high drug loading rate of 25.48 % for doxorubicin hydrochloride (DOX) was attained. After loading DOX, Ag2S/pSiO2/Ag@Au was coated with hyaluronic acid (HA) (DOX-Ag2S/pSiO2/Ag@Au/HA), which could target CD44 receptors that are overexpressed in cancer cells. The Ag@Au NSs maintained the impressive surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) of Ag NSs, enabling them to function as SERS substrate. During DOX release, the released DOX was detected through Raman technique. The Ag2S/pSiO2/Ag@Au/HA system demonstrated excellent performance in thermo-chemotherapy and allowed visualization of drug release behavior and vector imaging using Raman and fluorescence imaging technologies. These results demonstrated the potential of the Ag2S/pSiO2/Ag@Au/HA system as an effective carrier for therapeutic application. [Display omitted]