We have been working on the development of a light-activable microsystem composed of polycaprolactone microstructures that co-encapsulate chemotherapeutic agents (e.g. doxorubicin) and molybdenum disulfide nanosheets as the phototherapeutic agent. This system can repeatedly and simultaneously provide photothermal therapy and chemotherapy to superficial tumors in a pulsatile manner and exert synergistic anticancer effects. 

We performed SEM-EDS in order to identify the presence of the phototherapeutic agent in our microstructures. This phototherapeutic agent is MoS₂ nanosheets and by performing SEM-EDS we can identify the molybdenum (Mo, in green) and the sulfur (S, in pink) content. The identified presence of the phototherapeutic agent (MoS₂) in the microstructures confirms the ability of this system to be used for local and controlled drug delivery utilizing a switch on-off mechanism (upon near-infrared laser irradiation) for drug release, while it can also contribute to tumor thermal ablation.