The use of optical imaging tools to study nanomaterials and their therapeutic impact on cancer cells

Over the past decades, the medical exploitation of nanotechnology has been largely increasing and finding its way into translational research and clinical applications. While most clinically approved formulations consist of organic nanomaterials (NMs) (lipid or polymer-based), much effort is put into the further development of inorganic NMs. This mainly stems from the higher control over physicochemical properties and the ability to reproducibly synthesize NMs of very small sizes with very narrow size distributions, as well as the intrinsic physical properties of several inorganic NMs, bestowing them with magnetic or optical properties that can be exploited for diagnosis or therapeutic monitoring. Despite the increased interest for inorganic NMs over the past decades, questions regarding their safety persist as they were found to exert significant impact at cellular and subcellular levels, even at sub-cytotoxic doses, which currently impedes their further clinical translation. Nevertheless, multiple preclinical studies with inorganic NMs have shown promising results regarding their use for cancer therapy. Here, we therefore studied different biomedically relevant inorganic NM formulations (gold, silver, silica and iron oxide) and evaluated their biodistribution in function of tumor-specific properties, the extent of NM localization and delivery efficacy, and their effect on tumor-associated signalling mechanisms. To reach these goals, a highly multidisciplinary project has been set up, using different types of biomedically relevant NMs in combination with advanced in vivo imaging methods and further in-depth mechanistic studies.