Fig. 10: Assessment of potent antitumor effect of FeS@SRB-based therapy on orthotopic 4T1 tumor-bearing mice.

A Schematic illustration of the treatment procedure. B Representative fluorescence images of orthotopic 4T1 tumor-bearing mice at different time after intravenous injection with IR780-labeled SRB, FeS@BSA and FeS@SRB, respectively, and the corresponding fluorescence images of tumors and organs at 48 h. C Corresponding quantitative statistics of fluorescence intensity at different times post-i.v. injection. n = 3 biological independent replicates. Data are presented as mean ± SD. D The tumor growth curves after various treatments. n = 5 biological independent replicates. Data are presented as mean ± SD. E Tumor images and (F) tumor weight on day 14. n = 5 biological independent replicates. Data are presented as mean ± SD. G Representative spleen images extracted from mice in different treatment groups and (H) the corresponding spleen weight on day 14. n = 3 biological independent replicates. Data are shown as mean ± SD. I Mice weight change profiles during the treatment period. n = 5 biological independent replicates. Data are presented as mean ± SD. J Representative H&E, TUNEL, and Ki67 staining images of tumor tissues receiving various treatments. Scale bar: 200 μm. K Representative H&E staining images of lung and liver in mice on day 14 after different treatments. Scale bar: 400 μm. In the box plot, the box spans the interquartile range (first to third quartile), and the horizontal line indicates the median (second quartile). The lower and upper whiskers indicate the minimum and maximum values within 1.5 times the interquartile range from the first and third quartiles, respectively. G1, Control; G2, SRB; G3, FeS@BSA; G4, FeS@BSA + NIR; G5, FeS@SRB; G6, FeS@SRB + NIR. Source data are provided as a Source Data file. The experimental design diagram was created in BioRender. Dong, M. (2025) https://BioRender.com/38a0yn8.