New MR and optical imaging methods to draw a more comprehensive picture of cell fate and reaction of the immune system.
To exploit the spatial and temporal resolution of MRI in Molecular Imaging applications, it is necessary to improve the sensitivity and specificity of the currently available probes: • Sensitivity. A new high relaxivity tetrameric Gd-based agent has been shown to provide an impressive seven-fold sensitivity enhancement in respect to the commercial agents maintaining an analogous safety profile. • Specificity. An enzyme responsive Gd probe has been synthesized and tested. It reports about the citivity of beta-galactosidase, an enzyme largely used by biologists as reporter of gene expression. Important advances have been made in the field of the new family of MRI-CEST agents (CEST= Chemical Exchange Saturation Transfer). These MRI probes have great advantages in respect to the classical relaxation agents. Being frequency-encoding systems, it is possible to visualize (using different colours) more probes in the same image as every CEST agent is responsive only to a specific irradiation frequency. In the project, a paramagnetic complex, present as a pair of nmr-detectable isomers, has been selected for its high sensitivity and its ability to act as pH sensor. Mapping pH appears to be an important task to get new functional information from MR images in the presence of relevant pathologies. Moreover, upon changing the Lanthanide ion in the complex, systems able to visualize different cell types have been prepared and successfully tested. For details on the latest scientific findings, please visit: http://www.encite.org(se abrirá en una nueva ventana)
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