Facile synthesis of triple-hybrid organosilica/manganese dioxide hybrid nanoparticles for glutathione-adaptive shape-morphing and improving cellular drug delivery

Great attention has been received for the synthesis of multi-hybrid mesoporous organosilica nanomaterials (MONs), which can integrate multiple functions of organic saline groups into one nanoplatform. However, shape-morphing is absent in most previously reported multi-hybrid MONs. Herein, a glutathione-adaptive shape-morphing nanoplatform was constructed by facile doping of manganese dioxide in MONs frameworks. The size of the environmentally adaptive shape-morphing nanoplatform can be successfully regulated by the contents of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) and organic silanes, showing a controlled range of 153∼271 nm, and 271∼354 nm, respectively. Importantly, all these series of environmentally adaptive shape-morphing nanoparticles with different sizes can achieve isotropic-to-anisotropic morphology transition under a tumor-mocked environment containing glutathione (GSH). In addition, the statistical analysis of the cell proliferation test shows that the GSH-adaptive shape-morphing nanoparticles possess good biocompatibility and show significantly increased cellular drug delivery efficiency due to the doping of manganese dioxide. This study provides a facile strategy for the synthesis of environmentally adaptive shape-morphing micro-/nanoparticles, and exhibits a promising method for enhancing drug delivery efficiency for better tumor therapeutic effect.