Metal‐Organic Frameworks Deliver a Conjugate of Functional Oligonucleotides and Photosensitizer to Induce Apoptosis for Enhancing Chemotherapy

Abstract Metal‐organic frameworks are highly porous and biodegradable and have found numerous applications in biomedicine. However, the traditional chemotherapy of MOF‐drug delivery system remains a great challenge because of adverse side effects and cell tolerance. In this work, we have fabricated a hybrid drug delivery system based on ZIF‐90 encapsulated with Doxorubicin (DOX) and Ce6‐G3139 for enhanced chemotherapy. The released DOX can enter cell nucleus and trigger cell death. In addition, the G3139 binds to the anti‐apoptotic gene Bcl‐2 in tumor cells and related proteins are downregulated to inhibit cell proliferation. Meanwhile, the photosensitizer Ce6 carried by the nucleic acid will generate abundant reactive oxygen species under a near‐infrared (NIR) laser irradiation thus induces more cell apoptosis. It was worth mentioning that in vitro MTT test in the MCF‐7 cells assays revealed that DOX@ ZIF‐90/Ce6‐G3139 nanoparticles possessed stronger anticancer capability than free DOX or DOX@ ZIF‐90 nanoparticles indicating that the investigation offers an exciting new therapeutic strategy for the treatment of chemotherapy.