Laser light triggered-activated carbon nanosystem for cancer therapy

Among carbon-based nanomaterials, activated carbon (AC) may be an ideal candidate as a carrier for tumor therapeutic agents. Here we found a new property of nanoscale activated carbon (NAC) with narrow size distribution, namely the rapid conversion of light to thermal energy both in vitro and in vivo. An aqueous suspension of 200 μL of NAC (1 mg/mL) exhibited a rapid temperature increase of more than 35 °C after irradiation for 20 min with a 655-nm laser; this was within the temperature range for effective tumor treatment. We demonstrated that lung cancer cells (H-1299) incubated with bamboo nano-AC (BNAC) were killed with high efficiency after laser irradiation. In addition, mouse tumors with sizes smaller than the laser spot that had been injected with BNAC disappeared after irradiation. For tumors larger than the laser spot area, the incorporation of the photosensitizer ZnPc obviously increased the tumor growth inhibition efficiency of BNAC. BNAC-ZnPc was found to exhibit a synergistic effect when photothermal and photodynamic therapies were administered in combination. These results indicated that NAC can be used for high efficiency cancer phototherapy.