Biologically excretable AIE nanoparticles wear tumor cell-derived “exosome caps” for efficient NIR-II fluorescence imaging-guided photothermal therapy

Nanoparticles (NPs) assisted photothermal therapy (PTT) is a promising cancer treatment modality and has attracted the attention of the scientific mainstream. However, developing bio-excretable NPs that exhibit efficient optical properties and specific tumor targeting capability simultaneously is difficult. Herein, we develop a kind of hybrid nanovesicles consisting of bio-excretable aggregation-induced emission (AIE) NPs and tumor cell-derived “exosome caps” (TT3-oCB [email protected]) with enhanced second near-infrared (NIR-II, 900–1700 nm) fluorescence property and PTT functionality via electroporation. Compared with TT3-oCB NPs, TT3-oCB [email protected] exhibit excellent biocompatibility, specific targeting ability in vitro, homing to homologous tumors in vivo, and prolonged circulation time. Furthermore, TT3-oCB [email protected] were utilized as biomimetic NPs for NIR-II fluorescence imaging-guided PTT of tumors, due to their high and stable photothermal conversion capacity under 808 nm irradiation. Therefore, with the validation of other AIE NPs with poor targeting property, the tumor cell-derived EXO/AIE NP hybrid nanovesicles may provide an alternative artificial targeting strategy for improving tumor diagnosis and PTT.