Chemophotothermal therapy is an emerging treatment of metastatic and drug-resistant cancer anomalies. Among various photothermal agents tested, poly(dopamine) provides an excellent biocompatible alternative that can be used to develop novel drug delivery carriers for cancer treatment. This study explores the synthesis of starch-encapsulated, poly(dopamine)-coated core-shell nanoparticles in a one-pot synthesis approach and by surfactant-free approach. The nanoparticles produced are embellished with polymeric stealth coatings and are tested for their physiologic stability, photothermal properties, and drug delivery in metastatic triple-negative breast cancer cell (TNBC) lines. Our results indicate that stealth polymer-coated nanoparticles exhibit superior colloidal stability under physiologic conditions, and are excellent photothermal agents, as determined by the increase in temperature of solution in the presence of nanoparticles, upon laser irradiation. The chemotherapeutic drug–loaded nanoparticles also showed concentration-dependent toxicities in TNBC and in a brain metastatic cell line.

SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT This study develops, for the first time, biocompatible core-shell nanoparticles in a template-free approach that can serve as a drug delivery carrier and as photothermal agents for cancer treatment.

This work was supported by the Canadian Cancer Society Emerging Scholar Award [Grant #707147] and Beatrice Hunter Canadian Cancer Society’s JD Irving, Limited – Excellence in Cancer Research Funds.

No author has an actual or perceived conflict of interest with the contents of this article.

dx.doi.org/10.1124/jpet.123.001965.

↵This article has supplemental material available at jpet.aspetjournals.org.