Abstract
Treatment of disease can only be effective when timely and accurate diagnosis of the pathology is achieved. More precise diagnosis can be accomplished if the underlying molecular processes involved in the pathology can be imaged in vivo. This is the field of molecular imaging, which aims to visualize cellular function and molecular processes in living organisms in a non-invasive way. With that aim, molecular markers are specifically targeted by imaging contrast agents. Molecular MRI needs powerful targeted contrast agents. For that purpose, target-specific gadolinium-containing paramagnetic and superparamagnetic, iron oxide-based micelles have been developed. Micelles are lipid-based nanoparticles which are biocompatible and carry a high payload of MR contrast-generating agent. The coupling of high-affinity ligands makes the micelles target-specific. Additionally, this lipid-based micelle platform allows for incorporation of contrast generating molecules for other imaging modalities, e.g., fluorescence or nuclear imaging. This permits applications for multiple imaging modalities, making micelles a highly versatile contrast agent.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Prof. Holger Grüll (Department of Biomedical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands) for kindly providing the magnetite nanoparticles used to prepare the superparamagnetic micelles and Dr. Erik Sanders (Biomedical NMR, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands) for the micelle characterization by cryogenic transmission electron microscopy. The presented work was supported by the Dutch BSIK program “Molecular Imaging of Ischemic Heart Disease” (grant number: BSIK03033); the Netherlands Heart Foundation program grant “Screening for rupture-prone atherosclerotic plaques with molecular MRI” (grant number: 2006T106); the EU-sponsored Network-of-Excellence Diagnostic Molecular Imaging (DiMI), aimed at the advancement of molecular imaging technologies for cardiovascular and neurological applications (grant number: LSHB-CT-2005-512146); and the EU-sponsored integrated project MEDITRANS, a multidisciplinary consortium dealing with image-guided, targeted delivery of novel nano-medicines for the treatment of chronic inflammation, cancer, and neurodegeneration (grant number: NMP4-CT-2006-026668).
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Straathof, R., Strijkers, G.J., Nicolay, K. (2011). Target-Specific Paramagnetic and Superparamagnetic Micelles for Molecular MR Imaging. In: Schröder, L., Faber, C. (eds) In vivo NMR Imaging. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 771. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-61779-219-9_34
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-61779-219-9_34
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