Timely restoration of blood supply after myocardial ischemia is imperative for the treatment of acute myocardial infarction but causes additional myocardial ischemia/reperfusion (MI/R) injury, which has not been hitherto effectively targeted by interventions for MI/R injury. Hence, the development of advanced nanomedicine that can reduce apoptosis of cardiomyocytes while protecting against MI/R in vivo is of utmost importance. Herein, a redox-responsive and emissive TPE-ss covalent organic framework (COF) nanocarrier by integrating aggregation-induced emission luminogens and redox-responsive disulfide motifs into the COF skeleton is developed. TPE-ss COF allows for efficient loading and delivery of matrine, a renowned anti-cryptosporidial drug, which significantly reduces MI/R-induced functional deterioration and cardiomyocyte injury when injected through the tail vein into MI/R models at 5 min after 30 min of ischemia. Moreover, TPE-ss COF@Matrine shows a drastic reduction in cardiomyocyte apoptosis and improvements in cardiac function and survival rate. The effect of the TPE-ss COF carrier is further elucidated by enhanced cardiomyocyte viability and triphenyltetrazolium chloride staining in vitro. This work demonstrates the cardioprotective effect of TPE-ss COFs for MI/R injury, which unleashes the immense potential of using COFs as smart drug carriers for the peri-reperfusion treatment of ischemic heart disease with low cost, high stability, and single postoperative intervention.
Keywords: AIE; covalent organic framework; myocardial ischemia/reperfusion; reactive oxygen species; triphenyltetrazolium chloride (TTC) staining.
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