Advanced Irreversible Electroporation Ablation with Highly Biocompatible and Conductive Catalytic Materials

Irreversible electroporation (IRE) ablation has become one of the new ablation techniques for treating solid tumors. The success of IRE relies on the coverage of the whole tumor volume with a high electrical field while minimizing damage to healthy tissue. However, the irregular distribution of the high-voltage pulsed electric field is inevitably presented from the heterogeneous electrical properties of tumor tissue and surrounding structures. The inconsistency of IRE over tumor tissues induces cancer cell survival in the IRE ablation zone, increasing the risk of tumor recurrence and distant metastasis by incomplete tumor ablation. The applied high voltages frequently generate the patient’s muscle cramps, further limiting the potential impact of IRE in the ablation therapies.<br/>Novel nanoparticles with self-height conductivity during IRE ablation therapy can catalyze to enhance the effective electric field application around the tumor to expand the ablation boundary and reduce the electric threshold of tumor cell perforation, minimizing muscle contraction toward input voltages. Nanoparticle catalysis during IRE ablation of solid tumors is expected to overcome the current challenges of IRE ablation therapy. We aimed to develop highly biocompatible and conductive nanoparticles catalyzed advanced IRE ablation therapy that demonstrates enhanced cancer cell killing, minimized cancer cell survival, and CT contrast effect of IRE ablation