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IR‑783, a near‑infrared heptamethine cyanine dye, has been reported to possess cancer targeting and anticancer effects; Ηowever, the molecular mechanism by which IR‑783 exhibits anti‑breast cancer activity is unclear. In the present study, the inhibitory effects of IR‑783 on the proliferation and migration of breast cancer cells were investigated. Our results revealed that IR‑783 inhibited MDA‑MB‑231 and MCF‑7 cell proliferation in a dose‑ and time‑dependent manner by inducing cell cycle arrest at the G0/G1 phase. In addition, a Transwell assay demonstrated that IR‑783 treatment suppressed the migratory ability of MDA‑MB‑231 and MCF‑7 cells. Furthermore, IR‑783 treatment decreased the expression levels of matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)‑2 and MMP‑9 in MDA‑MB‑231 cells. Furthermore, IR‑783 induced MDA‑MB‑231 and MCF‑7 cell mitochondrial fission, and also decreased the levels of ATP. This was accompanied with a decrease in polymerized filamentous actin, which is the fundamental component of filopodia at the cell surface. Collectively, the results of the present study demonstrated that IR‑783 inhibited the proliferation and migration of MDA‑MB‑231 and MCF‑7 cells by inducing mitochondrial fission and subsequently decreasing ATP levels, resulting in cell cycle arrest and filopodia formation suppression. These findings suggest that IR‑783 may be developed into an effective novel drug for treating breast cancer.

IR-783 is a kind of heptamethine cyanine dye that exhibits imaging, cancer targeting and anticancer properties. A previous study reported that its imaging and targeting properties were related to mitochondria. However, the molecular mechanism behind the anticancer activity of IR-783 has not been well demonstrated. In this study, we showed that IR-783 inhibits cell viability and induces mitochondrial apoptosis in human breast cancer cells. Exposure of MDA-MB-231 cells to IR-783 resulted in the loss of mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP), adenosine triphosphate (ATP) depletion, mitochondrial permeability transition pore (mPTP) opening and cytochrome c (Cyto C) release. Furthermore, we found that IR-783 induced dynamin-related protein 1 (Drp1) translocation from the cytosol to the mitochondria, increased the expression of mitochondrial fission proteins mitochondrial fission factor (MFF) and fission-1 (Fis1), and decreased the expression of mitochondrial fusion proteins mitofusin1 (Mfn1) and optic atrophy 1 (OPA1). Moreover, knockdown of Drp1 markedly blocked IR-783-mediated mitochondrial fission, loss of MMP, ATP depletion, mPTP opening and apoptosis. Our in vivo study confirmed that IR-783 markedly inhibited tumour growth and induced apoptosis in an MDA-MB-231 xenograft model in association with the mitochondrial translocation of Drp1. Taken together, these findings suggest that IR-783 induces apoptosis in human breast cancer cells by increasing Drp1-mediated mitochondrial fission. Our study uncovered the molecular mechanism of the anti-breast cancer effects of IR-783 and provided novel perspectives for the application of IR-783 in the treatment of breast cancer., (© 2018 The Authors. Journal of Cellular and Molecular Medicine published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd and Foundation for Cellular and Molecular Medicine.)

Conventional enhanced permeation and retention (EPR) mediates the effects of many drugs, including the accumulation of nanocarriers at tumor sites, but its efficiency remains low. In this study, this limitation was overcome by developing a dual-targeting delivery system based on hyaluronan (HA, a major ligand of CD44) and tetraiodothyroacetic acid (tetrac, a specific ligand of αvβ3), which was exploited to carry docetaxel (DTX) for the synergistic active targeting to tumors. First, a tetrac-HA (TeHA) conjugate was synthesized and grafted onto the surfaces of solid lipid nanoparticles (SLNs) (TeHA-SLNs/DTX), with a high encapsulation efficiency of >91.6%. The resulting SLNs exhibited an approximately toroid morphology revealed using TEM. The cellular uptake and cytotoxicity of various formulations on CD44/αvβ3-enriched B16F10 cells were then assessed, and both results confirmed the selective uptake and high cytotoxicity of the TeHA-SLNs/DTX in a TeHA-dependent manner. In vivo imaging and vessel distribution tests revealed the efficiency of synergistic active targeting was higher than that of EPR-mediated passive targeting by the TeHA-SLNs to αvβ3-expressing tumor blood vessels and CD44-expressing tumor cells via selective targeting. Finally, in both xenograft tumor mice and in situ lung metastasis tumor mice, tumor growth was significantly inhibited by TeHA-SLNs/DTX. Therefore, TeHA-SLNs are an efficient system for the dual-targeted delivery of drugs to treat cancer in vivo., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)