Triplet-Triplet Annihilation Upconversion Based Photolysis: Applications in Photopharmacology.

The emerging field of photopharmacology is a promising chemobiological methodology for optical control of drug activities that could ultimately solve the off-target toxicity outside the disease location of many drugs for the treatment of a given pathology. The use of photolytic reactions looks very attractive for a light activated drug release but requires to develop photolytic reactions sensitive to red or NIR light excitation for better tissue penetration. In this review, we will present the concepts of triplet-triplet annihilation upconversion (TTA-UC) based photolysis and their recent in vivo applications for light induced drug delivery using photoactivatable nanoparticles (NPs). This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.