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In situ self-assembly for cancer therapy and imaging

Nature Reviews Materials volume 8, pages 710–725 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

In situ self-assembly — the in situ formation of complex materials via biochemical reactions of monomers — has enhanced the efficacy of drug delivery for cancer therapy and imaging. So far, nanomedicine has been confined to ex situ self-assembly, which is limited by poor deep-tumour penetration and poor blood circulation. By contrast, in situ self-assembly-based cancer treatments offer various advantages, including enhanced blood circulation of monomers, long-term drug delivery pharmacokinetics, low drug resistance and the ability to target deep tumours and organelles, which can result in disruption-mediated apoptosis and enable the imaging of cellular activity for effective cancer therapy and diagnosis. In this Review, we discuss the design of in situ self-assembled nanomedicines for cancer therapy and imaging based on various endogenous and exogenous stimuli in both the extracellular and the intracellular milieu. We also highlight the advantages of cancer treatment via multimodal dynamic transformations of nanostructures self-assembled in situ, including the ability to induce mechanical stress, deploy cancer-specific targeted therapies, obtain deep-tumour penetration and sustain prolonged drug retention time in the body. Finally, we discuss from a clinical viewpoint the challenges of in situ self-assembled nanomedicine and its potential to offer advanced alternatives to existing cancer therapies.

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Fig. 1: Mechanisms of in situ self-assembly.
Fig. 2: Overall concept of in situ self-assembly for cancer therapy and imaging.
Fig. 3: Extracellular in situ self-assembly.
Fig. 4: Intracellular in situ self-assembly.
Fig. 5: Multimodal dynamic control of in situ self-assembly for cancer therapy.
Fig. 6: Representative cancer diagnosis imaging techniques based on in situ self-assembly.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (no. RS-2023-00208427 to H.K.; and CRI project No. 2018R1A3B1052702 to J.S.K.).

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  1. These authors contributed equally: Jaewon Kim, Sungkyu Lee.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, Korea University, Seoul, Korea

    Jaewon Kim, Minhyeok Choi, Injun Lee, Eunji Kim, Chan Gyu Yoon & Jong Seung Kim

  2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Korea University, Seoul, Korea

    Sungkyu Lee, Yuri Kim & Heemin Kang

  3. School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Kanyi Pu

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Contributions

J.K. and S.L. contributed equally to this work. J.K., S.L., Y.K., K.P., H.K. and J.S.K. conceptualized the manuscript. J.K., S.L., Y.K., M.C., I.L., E.K., C.G.Y. and H.K. reviewed the relevant literature and wrote the manuscript. H.K. and J.S.K. edited and finalized the manuscript.

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Kim, J., Lee, S., Kim, Y. et al. In situ self-assembly for cancer therapy and imaging. Nat Rev Mater 8, 710–725 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41578-023-00589-3

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