808 nm light triggered black TiO2 nanoparticles for killing of bladder cancer cells

The black TiO2 nanoparticles are synthesized via a facile calcination method combined with an in-situ controllable solid-state reaction approach. The results indicate that the photocatalyst with a narrow band gap of similar to 2.32 eV extends the photoresponse to visible light and near infrared region. And thus more reactive oxygen species can be obtained to induce the cell-killing under 808 nm light triggering. The as-obtained black TiO2 nanoparticles exhibiting low toxicity, good biocompatibility and high anticancer effect in vitro, is demonstrated as efficient photosensitizers for phototherapy to kill the bladder cancer cells. These findings suggest that the facile synthetic black TiO2 nanomaterials will have broad application in biomedicine.