Recent advances of smart acid-responsive gold nanoparticles in tumor therapy

Due to the remarkable properties of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs), they have been extensively employed as a potential tool for the diagnosis and treatment of cancers. While the conventional drug delivery system fails to efficiently deliver the chemotherapeutics due to the complexity of tumor microenvironment, people have been seeking alternative nanoparticulate strategy to improve the tumor specificity, the therapeutic index as wells as the pharmacokinetic profile. The nontoxic and nonimmunogenic nature, the high permeability, and superior retention effect of AuNPs provide additional benefits by enabling easy penetration and accumulation of drugs at the tumor sites. Here in this review, we focused on discussing the recent advances regarding the design of acid-responsive AuNPs as well as their applications in drug/gene delivery and imaging in cancer diagnosis and therapy. Particularly, we highlighted the size switch strategies used in the development of acid-responsive AuNPs. This article is categorized under: Diagnostic Tools > in vivo Nanodiagnostics and Imaging Therapeutic Approaches and Drug Discovery > Nanomedicine for Oncologic Disease.