To achieve a sufficient targeting efficiency and prolonged half-life in-vivo, the physicochemical parameters including size and surface chemistry of therapeutic and imaging agents should be controlled. In this study, we prepared an iron oxide nanoparticle (IONP)-loaded, functional nano-carrier with different loading contents to modulate the mechanical properties of the system, and compared the characteristics of tumor targeting and imaging in terms of loading contents of IONP. As a functional nano-carrier, chitosan-conjugated, Pluronic-based nano-carrier with useful properties such as long blood circulation, good tumor targeting, and easy loading of macromolecules was used. IONPs were efficiently encapsulated into the nano-carrier (high loading efficiency over 95%) and the mechanical properties of the IONP-loaded nano-carrier were controlled by varying the loading amount of IONP. The IONP-loaded nano-carrier with the higher loading content of IONP (40 wt.%) was significantly more rigid (over 2×) than those with lower loading contents of IONP (5 and 15 wt.%). Although the nano-carrier with the higher loading content of IONP showed more enhanced MR contrast effect with higher T(2) relaxivity and higher intracellular uptake in vitro, characteristics of in-vivo tumor targeting and MR cancer imaging were not good compared to that of the nano-carrrier with the lower loading contents of IONP. Since different loading contents did not affect other characteristics of the system (size, surface chemistry, and surface charge), the present result suggests that the mechanical properties (strength/flexibility) of nano-systems are also important factors to be controlled for targeted delivery and imaging.
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