ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Pharmacol.
Sec. Experimental Pharmacology and Drug Discovery
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fphar.2025.1681276
A thermo-sensitive peptide hydrogel loaded with paclitaxel and antimony nanosheets for synergistic photothermal-chemotherapeutic treatment of breast cancer
Provisionally accepted
Bo Yan1Ling Gu1
Hajra Zafar2*Aiping Shi1Huanming Ge3Yu Jin4Nan Wang4Miao Wang4Binbin Liu4
Wu Yiqun5Tianli Tian4Rongjie Ding6- 1Department of Pharmacy, Taixing People’s Hospital, Taixing, Jiangsu, 225400, China., Taixing, China
- 2Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China
- 3Nanjing Bond International College, Nanjing, Jiangsu, 210008, China., Nanjing, China
- 4China Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, China
- 5Xuzhou Central Hospital, Xuzhou, China
- 6Department of Oncology, Taixing People’s Hospital, Taixing, Jiangsu, 225400, China., Taixing, China
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Breast cancer is one of the most common cancers in the world. Paclitaxel (PTX), a potent chemotherapeutic agent, is widely used in cancer treatment but suffers from poor aqueous solubility and systemic toxicity. In this study, we developed a thermosensitive peptide, TSP-5, which forms a stable hydrogel at 37°C and dissociates upon heating to 45°C to facilitate drug release. The hydrogel was co-loaded with PTX and photothermal agent antimony nanosheets (AM) for targeted delivery to tumor sites. Under near-infrared (NIR) laser irradiation, AM rapidly elevated the local temperature due to its high photothermal conversion efficiency, triggering hydrogel dissolution and subsequent PTX release. Simultaneously, AM-mediated photothermal therapy (PTT) contributed to tumor cell ablation. Both in vitro and in vivo studies demonstrated that the TSP-5 hydrogel significantly enhanced PTX solubility, reduced systemic toxicity, and improved antitumor efficacy, highlighting its potential as a promising platform for localized drug delivery.
Keywords: thermo-sensitive, Hydrogel, PTX, photothermal therapy, Cancer
Received: 07 Aug 2025; Accepted: 30 Sep 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yan, Gu, Zafar, Shi, Ge, Jin, Wang, Wang, Liu, Yiqun, Tian and Ding. 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: Hajra Zafar, hajrazafar@sjtu.edu.cn
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