Doxorubicin (DOX) is a widely used first-line antitumor agent; however, acquired drug resistance and side effects have become the main challenges to effective cancer therapy. Herein, DOX is loaded into iron-rich metal–organic framework/tannic acid (TA) nanocomplex to form a tumor-targeting and acid-activatable drug delivery system (MOF/TA-DOX, MTD). Under the acidic tumor microenvironment, MTD simultaneously releases DOX and ferrous ion (Fe²⁺) accompanied by degradation. Apart from the chemotherapeutic effect, DOX elevates the intracellular H₂O₂ levels through cascade reactions, which will be beneficial to the Fenton reaction between the Fe²⁺ and H₂O₂, to persistently produce hydroxyl radicals (•OH). Thus, MTD efficiently mediates chemodynamic therapy (CDT) and remarkably enhances the sensitivity of chemotherapy. More encouragingly, the cancer cell killing efficiency of MTD is up to ~86% even at the ultralow equivalent concentration of DOX (2.26 $\mathsf{\mu }$g/mL), while the viability of normal cells remained >88% at the same concentration of MTD. Taken together, MTD is expected to serve as drug-delivery nanoplatforms and •OH nanogenerators for improving chemo/chemodynamic synergistic therapy and reducing the toxic side effects.

Photodynamic Therapy (PDT) with the intrinsic advantages including non-invasiveness, spatiotemporal selectivity, low side-effects, and immune activation ability has been clinically approved for the treatment of head and neck cancer, esophageal cancer, pancreatic cancer, prostate cancer, and esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. Nevertheless, the PDT is only a strategy for local control of primary tumor, that it is hard to remove the residual tumor cells and inhibit the tumor metastasis. Recently, various smart nanomedicine-based strategies are developed to overcome the barriers of traditional PDT including the drawbacks of traditional photosensitizers, limited tissue penetrability of light, inefficient induction of tumor cell death and tumor resistance to the therapy. More notably, a growing number of studies have focused on improving the therapeutic efficiency by eliciting host immune system with versatile nanoplatforms, which heralds a broader clinical application prospect of PDT in the future. Herein, the pathways of PDT induced-tumor destruction, especially the host immune response is summarized, and focusing on the recent progress of nanosystems-enhanced PDT through eliciting innate immunity and adaptive immunity. We expect it will provide some insights for conquering the drawbacks current PDT and expand the range of clinical application through this review.

Minimally invasive ablation has been widely applied for treatment of various solid tumors, including hepatocellular carcinoma, renal cell carcinoma, breast carcinomas, etc. In addition to removing the primary tumor lesion, ablative techniques are also capable of improving the anti-tumor immune response by inducing immunogenic tumor cell death and modulating the tumor immune microenvironment, which may be of great benefit to inhibit the recurrent metastasis of residual tumor. However, the short-acting activated anti-tumor immunity of post-ablation will rapidly reverse into an immunosuppressive state, and the recurrent metastasis owing to incomplete ablation is closely associated with a dismal prognosis for the patients. In recent years, numerous nanoplatforms have been developed to improve the local ablative effect through enhancing the targeting delivery and combining it with chemotherapy. Particularly, amplifying the anti-tumor immune stimulus signal, modulating the immunosuppressive microenvironment, and improving the anti-tumor immune response with the versatile nanoplatforms have heralded great application prospects for improving the local control and preventing tumor recurrence and distant metastasis. This review discusses recent advances in nanoplatform-potentiated ablation-immune synergistic tumor therapy, focusing on common ablation techniques including radiofrequency, microwave, laser, and high-intensity focused ultrasound ablation, cryoablation, and magnetic hyperthermia ablation, etc. We discuss the advantages and challenges of the corresponding therapies and propose possible directions for future research, which is expected to provide references for improving the traditional ablation efficacy.

Multimodal targeted combination therapy that harnesses synergistic effects has emerged as a transformative paradigm in cancer therapy, progressively replacing traditional monotherapy. Herein, we report a tumor microenvironment (TME)-responsive multifunctional nanoplatform Cu-Ce6@DHA NPs (CCD NPs), which is self-assembled through the coordination of Cu²⁺, the antitumor drug dihydroartemisinin (DHA), and the photosensitizer chlorin e6 (Ce6). This nanoplatform enables the near-infrared-triggered combination of cuproptosis and ferroptosis for tumor treatment. Upon internalization by tumor cells, these nanoparticles undergo glutathione (GSH)-triggered disintegration, releasing their encapsulated payloads within the TME. The released Ce6 mediates potent photodynamic therapy (PDT) under laser irradiation, and DHA undergoes GSH-dependent activation to generate cytotoxic reactive oxygen species (ROS) and suppresses glutathione peroxidase 4 (GPX4), thereby amplifying ferroptotic cell death. Concurrently, the released copper ions deplete intracellular GSH and further inhibit GPX4, which exacerbates lipid peroxidation and promotes ferroptosis. Notably, the intracellular accumulation of copper ions disrupts mitochondrial metabolism by destabilizing iron-sulfur cluster (Fe-S) proteins and inducing oligomerization of lipoylated lipoylated dihydrolipoamide S-acetyltransferase (DLAT), ultimately triggering cuproptosis. Therefore, our findings establish a novel nanoplatform that simultaneously exploits metabolic vulnerabilities (via cuproptosis), redox imbalances (via ferroptosis), and photodynamic effects, providing a promising multimodal therapeutic strategy for cancer treatment.