Two-Photon Photosensitizer Polymer Conjugates for Combined Cancer Cell Death Induction and Two-Photon Fluorescence Imaging: Structure/Photodynamic Therapy Efficiency Relationship

One of the challenges of photodynamic therapy is to increase the penetration depth of light irradiation in the tumor tissues. Although two-photon excitation strategies have been developed, the two-photon absorption cross sections of clinically used photosensitizers are generally low (below 300 GM). Besides, photosensitizers with high cross section values are often non-water-soluble. In this research work, a whole family of photosensitizer-polymer conjugates was synthesized via the covalent binding of a photosensitizer with a relatively high cross section along a biocompatible copolymer chain. The resulting photosensitizer-polymer conjugates were water-soluble and could be imaged in cellulo by two-photon microscopy thanks to their high two-photon absorption cross sections (up to 2600 GM in water, in the NIR range). In order to explore the structure/photodynamic activity relationship of such macromolecular photosensitizers, the influence of the polymer size, photosensitizer density, and presence of charges along the polymer backbone was investigated (neutral, anionic, cationic, and zwitterionic conjugates were compared). The macromolecular photosensitizers were not cytotoxic in the absence of light irradiation. Their kinetics of cellular uptake in the B16-F10 melanoma cell line were followed by flow cytometry over 24 h. The efficiency of cell death upon photoactivation was found to be highly correlated to the cellular uptake in turn correlated to the global charge of the macromolecular photosensitizer which appeared as the determining structural parameter.