Figure 9.

The penetration of negatively charged nanocarriers in 2D-cultured cells (A, scale bar 20 μm), 3D spheroids (B, scale bar 200 μm), subcutaneous xenograft tumors (sc.) (C, internalization of GFHPM-DOX micelles are indicated by thick white arrows, thin white arrows indicate the blood vessels, scale bar 200 μm), and in situ lung cancer models (D, nodules are circled by the white dotted line, white triangles indicate the accumulation and distribution of GFHPM-DOX micelles in the lung interstitial, scale bar 200 μm). The results showed that negative nanocarriers also penetrated and distributed faster in 2D-cultured cells than in 3D spheroids and in vivo models, with 3D spheroids showing a similar pattern to the in vivo models.