Recent Advancement of Bio-Inspired Nanoparticles in Cancer Theragnostic

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dipak Maity and his team reviewed a hot topic entitled “Current Development of Bio-inspired Nanoparticles in Cancer Theragnostics.” The authors mainly focused on various nanoparticles in cancer diagnosis and treatment. In summary, the authors provided an excellent overview that is worth getting published in the MDPI Journal of NanoTheranostics. However, we recommend a detailed revision addressing the following issues carefully to reach out to many readers of different disciplines. 

1.     Expand the complete form of abbreviations or acronyms. 

For example: 

Line 79: EPR effect  enhanced permeation and retention (EPR) effect

Line 280: DOX  doxorubicin (DOX)

Line 280: PLGA  poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA)

2.     The same abbreviations or acronyms were used many times. Please show the abbreviation or acronym after its first appearance in the manuscript. 

For example: 

Lines 79 and 118: tumour microenvironment (TME) 

Lines 48 and 164: quantum dots (QDs)

3.     Don’t use abbreviations or acronyms if the description is given once in the manuscript. 

For example: 

Line 79: (BPNSs) 

Line 155: (TADF)

Line 161: (BBB)

Line 265: (CMC)

Line 265: (CMC)

Line 269: (MDSCs)

Line 269: (NK)

4.     Strange sentences were observed.

For example: 

Line 159: Near-infrared (NIR) emission, in particular, is tunable in (III) CDs  (III) Near-infrared (NIR) emission, in particular, is tunable in CDs

Line 212: almost every setting84.  almost every setting (84).

5.     In the literature, plenty of similar review articles focused on cancer theranostics. To differentiate from them, authors’ perspectives must be added.

For example: one of the major limitations of nanoparticle-based theranostics is the unwanted accumulation of the reticuloendothelial system (RES) organs or cells because it decreases the delivery efficiency of nanotheranostics to the targeted tissue or cell and can raise toxicity issues (Nat Mater 2016;15(11):1212-1221). Saturating the RES organs with drug-free nanoparticles (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nantod.2014.12.003) or transient stealth coating the scavenger cells of the RES by anchoring peptide-conjugated poly(ethylene glycol) (Sci Adv 2020;6(26):eabb8133) were boosted the delivery efficiency of drug-loaded nanoparticles. Don’t-eat-me signals were attached on the surface of nanoparticles to evade the RES capture, thereby improving the accumulation efficiency of nanodrugs in the targeted site (ACS Nano 2019;13(11):13015-13026).

6.     We recommend that the authors introduce nucleic acid therapeutics-loaded nanoparticles toward cancer treatment under section 3.4. Micelles.

For example,

Polyplex micelles are one of the promising gene delivery systems constructed through self-assembly upon simple mixing of PEG-polycationic block copolymers and therapeutically active nucleic acids. Polyplex micelles prepared from cyclic RGD (Arginine-Glycine-Aspartic acid) peptide ligand-installed PEG-poly(L-lysine-thiol) block polymers and plasmid DNA encoding soluble form of human vascular endothelial growth factor receptor-1 (VEGFR-1) (or soluble fms-like tyrosine kinase-1: sFlt-1) selectively targeted ⍺vβ5 and ⍺vβ3 integrin receptors overly expressed on cancer cells and tumor vascular endothelial cells upon intravenous injection. The targeted tumor cells expressed sFlt-1 protein, a potent antiangiogenic protein, which efficiently captured VEGF, inhibited new vasculature formation (anti-angiogenesis), and ultimately showed antitumor activity (Biomaterials 2014;35(20):5359-5368). Gene knockdown strategy was also used for anticancer activity using polyplex micelle loading siRNA. For example, integrin-targeted cRGD-decorated polyplex micelle loading siRNA targeting VEGF-receptors successfully knocked out the expression of VEGF receptors, thereby preventing the neovasculature formation in tumors (ACS Nano 2012;6(6):5174-89). 

English editing is required as few strange sentences were observed. 

Author Response

We sincerely thank you for your valuable comments on our paper entitled “Current Development of Bio-inspired Nanoparticles in Cancer Theragnostics”, which has been submitted to the journal “Journal of Nanotheranostics” (Manuscript ID: jnt-2453359) for the special issue "Advanced Functional and Tunable Nano-Systems for High-Performance Theranostic and Tissue Engineering Applications". Please find the attached file for our response to all the review comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper entitled “Current Development of Bio-inspired Nanoparticles in Cancer Theragnostics” by Tripathi and colleagues is a very confusing review. I think the manuscript is far from be suitable for publication, since I have many concerns on many points. Following, my main concerns about the manuscript.

1)      The title refers to “Bio-Inspired Nanoaprticles”, therefore I was expecting a review describing the more recent advances in the development of bioinspired nanoparticles like extracellular vesicles, exosomes, hybrid vesicles obtained by the fusion of liposomes with extracellular vesicles or by coating different nanoparticles (polymeric nanoparticles, quantum dots, etc.) with cell-derived membrane. However I did not find any of this in the manuscript. It is only a review mentioning the possibility of using nanoparticles like micelles, liposomes and other non bioinspired nanoparticles to treat and diagnose cancer.

2)      All the subsections are very general and does not provide the reader with significant information. For example, the Authors talk about quantum dots and liposomes in a very general way, giving basic and already well-known information.

3)      There is a subsection dedicated to “Radioisotopes”. Even if in this subsection the Authors mention the possibility of encapsulating radioisotopes in nanoparticles, I find this out of topic, since the topic of the review were nanoparticles.

4)      Some of the images are not clear; for example, I did not understand the meaning of Figure 1.

The quality of English might be improved.

Author Response

We sincerely thank all the reviewers for their valuable comments on our paper entitled “Current Development of Bio-inspired Nanoparticles in Cancer Theragnostics”, which has been submitted to the journal “Journal of Nanotheranostics” (Manuscript ID: jnt-2453359) for the special issue "Advanced Functional and Tunable Nano-Systems for High-Performance Theranostic and Tissue Engineering Applications". Please fine the attached file for our response to all the review comments. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear authors,

please find attached my comments

Best Regards

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Moderate editing of English language required

Author Response

We sincerely thank all the reviewers for their valuable comments on our paper entitled “Current Development of Bio-inspired Nanoparticles in Cancer Theragnostics”, which has been submitted to the journal “Journal of Nanotheranostics” (Manuscript ID: jnt-2453359) for the special issue "Advanced Functional and Tunable Nano-Systems for High-Performance Theranostic and Tissue Engineering Applications". Please find the attached file for our response to all the review comments. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Accepted in present form

Reviewer 2 Report

The Authors modified the paper by following the comments and suggestions.