For the preparation of G13/27-DiMan, 20 mL each of the citrate stabilized G13 or G27 stock solution was directly added with the required amount of LA-EG4-DiMan ligand stock solution in water at a GNP: ligand molar ratio of 1:3 000 for G13 or 1:10 000 for G27. The resulting solution was stirred at RT in the dark overnight to make the Gx-DiMan conjugates via gold-thiol self-assembly. After that, the resulting mixtures were divided into 1.5 mL portions into eppendorf tubes and centrifuged at 17 000 x g for 30 mins for G13-DiMan or 6 000 × g for 15 mins for G27-DiMan conjugates to remove any unbound free ligands. After careful withdrawal of supernatant, the Gx-DiMan residues were washed with pure water (3 × 500 μL), followed by centrifugation three times to remove any unbound free ligands. For G27, the eppendorf tubes were pre-washed with 0.025% Tween-20 aqueous solution before being used in Gx-DiMan purification to prevent nanoparticle sticking to the eppendorf walls. To prepare Gx-DiMan conjugates with different surface glycan densities (e.g., 75%, 50% and 25%), LA-EG4-OH and LA-EG4-DiMan were mixed in the desired percentages first before being used in GNP conjugation under the same total ligand: Gx molar ratios and purified using the same method as Gx-DiMan. The Dh histograms and UV-vis spectra for G13/27-DiMan/-OH were given in Fig. and S7 (SI). The concentrations of Gx-DiMan/OH conjugates were determined by the Beer-Lambert law using their peak absorbance at ∼520 nm and molar extinction coefficient of 2.32 × 10 8 M -1 cm -1 for G13, and 2.39 × 10 9 M -1 cm -1 for G27, respectively (see SI, Fig. ).