摘要
Natural products,as a gift of nature to humanity,have long been used as drugs or pharmacological actives to help people cure various diseases.Yet we still know comparatively little about their ability to be materials.In recent years,some small molecule natural products isolated from traditional Chinese medicines have been found to have new features,namely,self-assembly to form gels(i.e.,natural product gels,NPG).However,the application development of these natural products is seriously lacking,which greatly weakens their practical value and delays the maturity of the field.Here,a series of selfassembled triterpenoid natural products are used as materials(gel scaffolds)to construct drug delivery systems.Surprisingly,these NPG not only exhibit the excellent self-healing,controlled gelation,good safety and sustained release,but also achieve synergistic treatment of tumors through bioactive natural products.Compared with non-bioactive gel scaffolds,NPG scaffolds show great advantages in tumor therapy,including optimal tumor inhibition,preferable health,better body recovery,stronger immune function,less toxic side effects and longer survival.The successful construction of NPG scaffolds not only takes full advantage of the self-assembled natural products,but also takes an important step in the development of new applications for natural products.
基金
supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China,Nos.31972040 and 31571798
Heilongjiang provincial financial support project(Xin Yang)
Harbin Special Foundation for Excellent Academic Leader Project,No.2014RFXXJ113,China