HSP90 Antisense Oligonucleotide Enhances the Inhibitory Effect of Photothermal Therapy on Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Cells

Photothermal therapy is a potential strategy to treat triple-negative breast cancer. The expression of HSP90 in the tumor cells has been identified as a culprit for reducing the effectiveness of photothermal therapy, so using reagents with photothermal conversion to deliver HSP inhibitors can achieve good tumor suppression. However, the potential toxicity of small molecule HSPs inhibitors limits their further application development. Therefore, this study constructed a nanoplatform by graphene oxide (GO) to deliver antisense oligonucleotide (ASO) of HSP90 to improve the therapeutic effect. The photothermal performance of GO was confirmed by infrared thermal imager. MTT results showed that tumor cell viability was lower after the addition of ASO under irradiation. In addition, the result of western blot revealed that the expression of HSP90 decreased by 32% compared to the blank group under the action of ASO. All the above results indicated that our strategy enhances the inhibition of triple-negative breast cancer cells via suppressing the expression of HSP90 in photothermal therapy.