Chemotherapy is increasingly used in breast cancer treatment; however, drug resistance remains the major limitation and challenge of present chemotherapy. Previous studies indicated that the combination of nanomaterials and chemotherapy drug could overcome such resistance and exhibit a synergistic anticancer effect. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the antibreast cancer effect of cyclophosphamide, gemcitabine, 5-fluorouracil, oxaliplatin, or doxorubicin combined with silver nanotriangles (AgNTs), and screen out the drug with the most broad-spectrum and strongest synergistic activity. Transmission electron microscopy image showed that the synthesized AgNTs were triangular and truncated triangular in shape with a mean edge length of 126 nm. The synergistic antibreast cancer effect of AgNTs plus cyclophosphamide or gemcitabine was found to be cell type–specific, while 5-fluorouracil, oxaliplatin, and doxorubicin displayed synergistic effects with AgNTs on viabilities of various breast cancer cell lines (MDA-MB-231, MCF-7, and 4T1), and doxorubicin was the strongest in general. Furthermore, the synergism was proved to mainly result from reactive oxygen species–mediated cell apoptosis. These findings could potentially be exploited for new highly efficient combination treatment of breast cancer.

化学疗法越来越多地用于乳腺癌的治疗。然而，耐药性仍然是当前化学疗法的主要限制和挑战。先前的研究表明，纳米材料和化学疗法药物的组合可以克服这种耐药性并表现出协同的抗癌作用。这项研究的目的是评估环磷酰胺，吉西他滨，5-氟尿嘧啶，奥沙利铂或阿霉素联合银纳米三角形（AgNTs）的抗乳腺癌作用，并筛选出具有最广谱和最强协同活性的药物。透射电子显微镜图像显示，合成的AgNTs为三角形和截头三角形，平均边缘长度为126nm。发现AgNTs加上环磷酰胺或吉西他滨的协同抗乳腺癌作用是特定于细胞类型的，而5-氟尿嘧啶，奥沙利铂和阿霉素显示与AgNTs协同作用对多种乳腺癌细胞系（MDA-MB-231，MCF -7和4T1），而阿霉素通常是最强的。此外，协同作用主要是由活性氧介导的细胞凋亡引起的。这些发现可能会被用于乳腺癌的新型高效联合治疗。事实证明，这种协同作用主要是由活性氧介导的细胞凋亡引起的。这些发现可能会被用于新型高效的乳腺癌联合治疗。事实证明，这种协同作用主要是由活性氧介导的细胞凋亡引起的。这些发现可能会被用于新型高效的乳腺癌联合治疗。