Molecular photoacoustic imaging of breast cancer using an actively targeted conjugated polymer.
Int J Nanomedicine
; 10: 387-97, 2015.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-25609951
ABSTRACT
Conjugated polymers (CPs) are upcoming optical contrast agents in view of their unique optical properties and versatile synthetic chemistry. Biofunctionalization of these polymer-based nanoparticles enables molecular imaging of biological processes. In this work, we propose the concept of using a biofunctionalized CP for noninvasive photoacoustic (PA) molecular imaging of breast cancer. In particular, after verifying the PA activity of a CP nanoparticle (CP dots) in phantoms and the targeting efficacy of a folate-functionalized version of the same (folate-CP dots) in vitro, we systemically administered the probe into a folate receptor-positive (FR+ve) MCF-7 breast cancer xenograft model to demonstrate the possible application of folate-CP dots for imaging FR+ve breast cancers in comparison to CP dots with no folate moieties. We observed a strong PA signal at the tumor site of folate-CP dots-administered mice as early as 1 hour after administration as a result of the active targeting of the folate-CP dots to the FR+ve tumor cells but a weak PA signal at the tumor site of CP-dots-administered mice as a result of the passive accumulation of the probe by enhanced permeability and retention effect. We also observed that folate-CP dots produced ~4-fold enhancement in the PA signal in the tumor, when compared to CP dots. These observations demonstrate the great potential of this active-targeting CP to be used as a contrast agent for molecular PA diagnostic imaging in various biomedical applications.
Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Polymers
/
Breast Neoplasms
/
Contrast Media
/
Molecular Imaging
/
Photoacoustic Techniques
Limits:
Animals
/
Female
/
Humans
Language:
En
Journal:
Int J Nanomedicine
Year:
2015
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Singapore