Ultrasound targeted microbubble destruction-triggered nitric oxide release via nanoscale ultrasound contrast agent for sensitizing chemoimmunotherapy

Immunotherapy had demonstrated inspiring effects in tumor treatment, but only a minority of people could benefit owing to the hypoxic and immune-suppressed tumor microenvironment (TME). Therefore, there was an urgent need for a strategy that could relieve hypoxia and increase infiltration of tumor lymphocytes simultaneously. In this study, a novel acidity-responsive nanoscale ultrasound contrast agent (L-Arg@PTX nanodroplets) was constructed to co-deliver paclitaxel (PTX) and L-arginine (L-Arg) using the homogenization/emulsification method. The L-Arg@PTX nanodroplets with uniform size of about 300 nm and high drug loading efficiency displayed good ultrasound diagnostic imaging capability, improved tumor aggregation and achieved ultrasound-triggered drug release, which could prevent the premature leakage of drugs and thus improve biosafety. More critically, L-Arg@PTX nanodroplets in combination with ultrasound targeted microbubble destruction (UTMD) could increase cellular reactive oxygen species (ROS), which exerted an oxidizing effect that converted L-Arg into nitric oxide (NO), thus alleviating hypoxia, sensitizing chemotherapy and increasing the CD8 + cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) infiltration. Combined with the chemotherapeutic drug PTX-induced immunogenic cell death (ICD), this promising strategy could enhance immunotherapy synergistically and realize powerful tumor treatment effect. Taken together, L-Arg@PTX nanodroplets was a very hopeful vehicle that integrated drug delivery, diagnostic imaging, and chemoimmunotherapy. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT: [Image: see text] SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12951-023-01776-8.