Hyperthermia (HT) is currently used as a non-invasive technique for cancer therapy, whereby biological tissues are exposed to higher than normal temperatures for selective ablation of tumoral cells. Heating treatments can be applied using external heating sources such as ultrasounds; however, heating only malignant cells is difficult to attain. Recently, there has been a growing interest in the use of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) to selectively generate heat in a spatiotemporal fashion, which is known as photothermal therapy (PTT). AuNPs can be synthetized as stimuli-responsive systems, which are able to absorb incident light coming from a laser outside the body and generate heat only in the tissues where AuNPs are allocated. In fact, they can be finely tuned to absorb light in the near-infrared (NIR) spectral range, known as the "biological window", where body tissues are mainly transparent. Although PTT has entered clinical trials, the molecular mechanisms underlying the in vivo cellular responses to heat stress remain unclear to date. Here,in line withEuropean strategies aimed to reduce vertebrate experimentation, we propose an invertebrate animal, the small freshwater polyp Hydra vulgaris (Cnidaria, Hydrozoa) to study the response of different AuNPs to PTT. This organism, more complex than cells, exhibit however functional conservation of main physiological pathways, such as the heat response. To this end, gold nanoprisms (NPr) and nanorods (NR) absorbing in the NIR range have been synthetized, functionalized and characterized. Their heating efficiency upon irradiation with a NIR-laser (1064 nm) in vitro has been evaluated, demonstrating that both types of nanoparticles can be effectively used to kill cells. Also, their toxicity, internalization rate and gene profiling after laser irradiation in Hydra will be presented. The obtained results demonstrate that AuNPrs serve as an excellent photothermal agent, and that Hydra could be considered a good modelto scan the heating properties of AuNPs.

Synthesis of gold nanoprisms and nanorods as photothermal agents: comparison of their heating ability for bioapplications

Maria Moros;Francesco Merola;Pietro Ferraro;Angela Tino;Claudia Tortiglione
2016

Abstract

Hyperthermia (HT) is currently used as a non-invasive technique for cancer therapy, whereby biological tissues are exposed to higher than normal temperatures for selective ablation of tumoral cells. Heating treatments can be applied using external heating sources such as ultrasounds; however, heating only malignant cells is difficult to attain. Recently, there has been a growing interest in the use of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) to selectively generate heat in a spatiotemporal fashion, which is known as photothermal therapy (PTT). AuNPs can be synthetized as stimuli-responsive systems, which are able to absorb incident light coming from a laser outside the body and generate heat only in the tissues where AuNPs are allocated. In fact, they can be finely tuned to absorb light in the near-infrared (NIR) spectral range, known as the "biological window", where body tissues are mainly transparent. Although PTT has entered clinical trials, the molecular mechanisms underlying the in vivo cellular responses to heat stress remain unclear to date. Here,in line withEuropean strategies aimed to reduce vertebrate experimentation, we propose an invertebrate animal, the small freshwater polyp Hydra vulgaris (Cnidaria, Hydrozoa) to study the response of different AuNPs to PTT. This organism, more complex than cells, exhibit however functional conservation of main physiological pathways, such as the heat response. To this end, gold nanoprisms (NPr) and nanorods (NR) absorbing in the NIR range have been synthetized, functionalized and characterized. Their heating efficiency upon irradiation with a NIR-laser (1064 nm) in vitro has been evaluated, demonstrating that both types of nanoparticles can be effectively used to kill cells. Also, their toxicity, internalization rate and gene profiling after laser irradiation in Hydra will be presented. The obtained results demonstrate that AuNPrs serve as an excellent photothermal agent, and that Hydra could be considered a good modelto scan the heating properties of AuNPs.
2016
Istituto di Scienze Applicate e Sistemi Intelligenti "Eduardo Caianiello" - ISASI
gold nanoparticles
hyperthermia
Hydra vulgaris
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14243/328811
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