Towards more accurate bioimaging of drug nanocarriers: turning aggregation-caused quenching into a useful tool.

Towards more accurate bioimaging of drug nanocarriers: turning aggregation-caused quenching into a useful tool. Adv Drug Deliv Rev. 2019 May 31;: Authors: Qi J, Hu X, Dong X, Lu Y, Lu H, Zhao W, Wu W Abstract One of the current challenges in the monitoring of drug nanocarriers lies in the difficulties in discriminating the carrier-bound signals from the bulk signals of probes. Environment-responsive probes that enable signal switching are making steps towards a solution to this problem. Aggregation-caused quenching (ACQ), a phenomenon generally regarded as unfavorable in bioimaging, has turned out to be a promising characteristic for achieving environment-responsiveness and eliminating free-probe interference. So-called ACQ probes emit fluorescence when dispersed molecularly within the carrier matrix but quench immediately and absolutely once they are released into the ambient aqueous environment upon the degradation of the nanocarriers. Therefore, the fluorescence observed represents integral nanocarriers. Based on this rationale, the in vivo fates of various nanocarriers have been explored using live imaging equipment, with very interesting findings revealing the role of the particles. The current applications are however restricted to nanocarriers with highly hydrophobic matrices (lipid or polyester nanoparticles) or with a hydrophobic core-hydrophilic shell structure (micelles). The ACQ-based bioimaging strategy is emerging as a ...
Source: Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews - Category: Drugs & Pharmacology Authors: Tags: Adv Drug Deliv Rev Source Type: research