High-Throughput Synthesis of Single-Layer MoS₂ Nanosheets as a Near-Infrared Photothermal-Triggered Drug Delivery for Effective Cancer Therapy

We report here a simple, high-yield yet low-cost approach to design single-layer MoS₂ nanosheets with controllable size <i>via</i> an improved oleum treatment exfoliation process. By decorating MoS₂ nanosheets with chitosan, these functionalized MoS₂ nanosheets have been developed as a chemotherapeutic drug nanocarrier for near-infrared (NIR) photothermal-triggered drug delivery, facilitating the combination of chemotherapy and photothermal therapy into one system for cancer therapy. Loaded doxorubicin could be controllably released upon the photothermal effect induced by 808 nm NIR laser irradiation. <i>In vitro</i> and <i>in vivo</i> tumor ablation studies demonstrate a better synergistic therapeutic effect of the combined treatment, compared with either chemotherapy or photothermal therapy alone. Finally, MoS₂ nanosheets can also be used as a promising contrast agent in X-ray computed tomography imaging due to the obvious X-ray absorption ability of Mo. As a result, the high-throughput oleum treatment exfoliation process could be extended for fabricating other 2D nanomaterials, and the NIR-triggered drug release strategy was encouraging for simultaneous imaging-guided cancer theranostic application