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Photothermal therapy with gold nanoparticles as an anticancer medication

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Abstract

Over the past few decades, gold nanoparticles and diverse gold nano-forms have been considered for both cancer therapy and bioimaging due to their surface plasmon resonance effect and its capability of loading contrast agent. This effect enables thermal destruction of cells or organs by drastically elevating temperature when exposed to a specific energy of visible light either near infrared light. In addition, chemical modifications of the surfaces of gold nanoparticles or nano-forms are well known. Sulfur-containing functional groups of biomolecules or polymers can be easily conjugated with Aurum atoms on the surface of gold nanoparticles. There are also various nano-forms with different shapes and sizes derived from gold nanoparticles such as the nanosphere, nanorod, nanocage, nanoshell, and nanoporous gold disks. The various forms of nano-scaled gold materials have unique properties that can be used as carrier, simultaneously thermal destruction agent. Its properties of the materials are able to applied to a number of desired purposes. Regardless of the physicochemical properties of gold nanoparticles, they present several challenges, such as the instance energy penetrating depth availability aspect required for gold nanoparticles to enter organs and the cellular toxicity issues of nano-scaled gold particles in the body. The purpose of this review is to introduce the advantages using gold nanoparticles-based materials and its diverse approaches to several types of cancer therapies due to its distinct properties.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by a Mid-Career Research program grant (NRF-2015R1A2A1A05001832) through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Korean government.

Conflicts of the interest

These authors (H.S. Kim and D.Y. Lee) declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Bioengineering, College of Engineering, and BK21 PLUS Future Biopharmaceutical Human Resources Training and Research Team, and Institute of Nano Science & Technology (INST), Hanyang University, Seoul, 04763, Republic of Korea

    Hyung Shik Kim & Dong Yun Lee

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  1. Hyung Shik Kim
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  2. Dong Yun Lee
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Correspondence to Dong Yun Lee.

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Kim, H.S., Lee, D.Y. Photothermal therapy with gold nanoparticles as an anticancer medication. Journal of Pharmaceutical Investigation 47, 19–26 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40005-016-0292-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40005-016-0292-6

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