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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2016 Nov 18.
Published in final edited form as: Adv Healthc Mater. 2015 Mar 13;4(16):2530–2556. doi: 10.1002/adhm.201400781

Figure 7.

Figure 7

Targeted assembly of drug-carrying ELPs in tumor tissues. A) Blood vessels in healthy tissues retain soluble, large-molecule ELPs, while those that leak into the extracellular matrix are quickly drained by lymph vessels. B) Tumor tissues tend to be characterized by leaky blood vessels and scarce lymphatic drainage. Consequently, a high concentration of soluble ELPs build up in the tumor environment. C) Localized hyperthermia of tumor tissues by focused ultrasound, microwave or infrared radiation increases the leakiness of blood vessels and accumulation of ELPs above a critical concentration. The hyperthermic tumor environment induces ELP coacervation to preferentially present the bioactive moieties on the microspherule surface.