Synergistic treatment of doxorubicin-resistant breast cancer by the combination of chemotherapy and photodynamic therapy

Drug resistance is the main challenge in cancer treatment by chemotherapy. To overcome the problems, photodynamic therapy (PDT) can be introduced to increase the internalization of chemotherapeutics. Herein, we design and fabricate core-shell nanostructures for the increased therapy effect of drug resistant cancers. Human serum albumin (HSA) is conjugated with Rose Bengal (RB) (HSA-RB) to improve the endocytosis efficiency of the photosensitizer . Then we fabricated a core-shell nanostructure by coating with doxorubicin (DOX)-loaded CaCO 3 (CaCO 3 @DOX) with HSA-RB and dialdehyde carboxymethyl cellulose (DCMC) via a layer-by-layer technique. The formed CaCO 3 @DOX@(HSA-RB/DCMC) n nanostructures can be easily endocytosed by DOX resistant cancer cells (MCF-7/ADR) in the presence of low dose PDT, and greatly prevent the proliferation of cancer cells by the synergistic effect of PDT and chemotherapy. The nanostructures present efficient methods to solve drug resistance problems in the cure of cancers.