Lecture: Nanoparticle Based Photodynamic Therapy and Photothermal Therapy For Cancer Treatment
Time: 15:30p.m., March 20th, 2015
Place: Room 214, Building No. 16, Wushan Campus
Speaker: Professor CHEN Wei (University of Texas, USA)

Abstract：Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a promising recipe for cancer treatment. However, the difficulty of light penetration into deep tissue has hitherto prevented the application of photodynamic therapy for deep cancer treatment. The three components that are required for PDT are oxygen, photosensitizers, and light. To solve the problem of light penetration and to enhance the PDT treatment for deep cancers, I have proposed a new PDT system in which the light is provided by afterglow nanoparticles with attached photosensitizers. When the nanoparticle-photosensitizer conjugates are targeted to tumor and stimulated by X-ray during radiotherapy, the particles will generate light to activate the photosensitizers for photodynamic therapy. Therefore, the radiation and photodynamic therapies are combined and occur simultaneously, and the tumor destruction will be more efficient. More importantly, it can be used for deep tumor treatment as X-ray can penetrate deep into the tissue such as Breast and prostate cancers. This novel modality is called nanoparticle self-lighting photodynamic therapy (NSLPDT). In this presentation, I will report the progress of the research in my group on the design, synthesis and evaluation of nanoparticle conjugates for photodynamic therapy.