REVIEW article
Front. Bioeng. Biotechnol.
Sec. Biomaterials
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fbioe.2025.1601476
This article is part of the Research TopicInsights in Biomaterials 2025 - Novel Developments, Current Challenges, and Future PerspectivesView all articles
Metal-Organic Frameworks-loaded Indocyanine Green for Enhanced Phototherapy: A Comprehensive Review
Provisionally accepted
- 1Nantong University, Nantong, China
- 2Danyang People's Hospital, Danyang, Jiangsu Province, China
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Indocyanine green (ICG) is a small molecule approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for liver function imaging and angiography. ICG can be used not only for near-infrared imaging but also for photodynamic and photothermal therapy. However, the hydrophilicity of ICG leads to a relatively short blood circulation time, and it is easily cleared by organs such as the liver. Moreover, it lacks the targeting ability to the diseased sites. By using the natural porous metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as the carrier, high-efficiency loading of ICG molecule can be achieved, which has significantly broadened its biomedical applications. This review comprehensively summarizes the research work in recent years regarding the utilization of MOF as a carrier to load ICG in the bioapplication such as malignant cancer inhibition, antibacterial treatment, and the treatment of Alzheimer's disease. It focuses on summarizing the design concepts of different types of MOF carriers for loading ICG molecules. Meanwhile, it emphasizes the enhanced therapeutic effects achieved when multiple treatment modalities realized through post-modification are combined with ICG-mediated phototherapy. It is expected that through the summary of this review, the biomedical applications of ICG in the field of disease treatment can be further promoted.
Keywords: Indocyanine Green, Metal-Organic Frameworks, Photodynamic therapy, photothermal therapy, cancer therapy
Received: 28 Mar 2025; Accepted: 05 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zheng, Zou, Zhang, Chen and Wang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Xiaohua Zheng, Nantong University, Nantong, China
Weiqi Wang, Nantong University, Nantong, China
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