1. Journal Source: Exploration

2. Original Title: Harnessing anti‑tumor and tumor‑tropism functions of macrophages via nanotechnology for tumor immunotherapy

3. Research Highlights: This review summarizes the progress of utilizing nanotechnology to regulate macrophages for tumor immunotherapy, sorts out multiple strategies for modulating tumor-associated macrophages, outlines the research status of macrophages and their derivatives as targeted delivery vehicles, and analyzes the limitations of existing studies.

4. Innovations: 1. The regulatory pathways of macrophages involved in tumor immunity are systematically classified into four categories: inhibiting recruitment, depletion, repolarization, and phagocytosis regulation; 2. Two action modes of nanomaterials are summarized, which can act as vehicles to deliver regulators or directly modulate macrophage functions; 3. The advantages and disadvantages of different delivery systems including live macrophages, macrophage membranes and extracellular vesicles are reviewed.

5. Material Development: (1) Materials: various functional nanocarriers; biological carriers such as macrophages, macrophage membranes, macrophage-derived extracellular vesicles and nanovesicles. (2) Functions: delivering immune regulatory components; directly modulating macrophage phenotypes; possessing tumor-tropic capacity to cross multiple physiological barriers and achieve enrichment at lesion sites.

6. Outlook: Current systems are still restricted by multiple barriers in the tumor microenvironment. Future efforts are required to develop intelligent nanosystems with spatiotemporally controllable release, and explore feasible strategies to maintain the stability of the anti-tumor phenotype of macrophages.

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