Fig. 5: In vivo anti-tumor efficacy of Au@MIL in orthotopic HepG2-Red-FLuc HCC xenograft mice.

HepG2-Red-FLuc orthotopically injected xenograft mice (8–10 weeks, male) were administered with a single dose of sterilized PBS (100 µL), 3000 ppm of 100 nm Au@PEG (100 µL sterilized PBS), and 3000 ppm of 100 nm Au@MIL (100 µL sterilized PBS) via intravenous injection. a ICP-MS assessed the biodistribution of Au@MIL at different post-treatment time points (1, 4, 8, 24, and 72 h) in the following samples: heart, lung, spleen, kidney, liver, HCC tumor, and feces collected from treated mice (n  =  3 replicates). b, c Orthotopic tumor growth of HepG2-Red-FLuc cells in xenograft mice treated with PBS, Au@PEG, and Au@MIL monitored by IVIS system (n = 5). The luminance signal was measured as the total flux ratio on post-treatment Day 0, 4, 7, 11, and 14 compared to Day 0. d Ex vivo luminance signals (total flux) of HepG2-Red-FLuc cells in the liver, collected from mice treated with PBS, Au@PEG, and Au@MIL after 14 days, were monitored using the IVIS system (n = 5). e The appearance of livers with HCC from mice treated with PBS, Au@PEG, and Au@MIL was assessed at Day 14 post-treatment (n = 5). The yellow dashed circle indicates the visible tumor area. f Morphology of HCC in liver sections collected from mice treated with PBS, Au@PEG, and Au@MIL after 14 days was assessed by hematoxylin and eosin staining (Scale bar, 1 mm). The yellow dashed circle indicated the tumor areas, and the expression of cleaved caspase-3 (Asp175) and 4-Hydroxynonenal within them was detected by IHC staining (Scale bar, 200 µm). The results were repeated at least three times independently with similar tendencies, and one representative experiment is shown. g The survival rate of HepG2-Red-FLuc HCC xenograft mice treated with PBS, Au@PEG, and Au@MIL (n = 5) was assessed, and p-values were calculated using the log-rank test. a Data are presented as mean ± SEM, with p-values calculated using a two-tailed Student’s t-test. b, c, d Data are presented as mean ± SD, with p-values calculated using One-way ANOVA. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.