Nuclear Medicine Diagnosis
Nuclear medicine, which has contributed significantly to the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer worldwide, relies heavily on radionuclides with different half-lives and emitted energies. As a non-invasive therapeutic tool, nuclear medicine allows for the characterization and quantification of bioengineering. Nuclear medicine typically uses radioactive probes to capture information. Due to the short imaging time, nephrotoxicity, and non-specificity of the currently used small molecule radioisotopes in general, the development of new radioactive probes is crucial. With the rapid development of nanomedicine and nanotechnology, it is possible to develop functional nanoprobes for nuclear biomedicine.
Introduction into Nuclear Medicine Diagnosis
Nuclear medicine, also known as nucleology, is the diagnosis and treatment of disease through radioactive substances. As one of the most powerful techniques for diagnosing and treating disease, nuclear medicine is an integration of physics, chemistry, engineering, and medicine. The two most common imaging modalities used for nuclear medicine diagnosis include single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography (PET). Nuclear medicine diagnostics uses radioactive tracers (radiopharmaceuticals) to assess body functions for disease diagnosis and treatment. A radioactive tracer consists of radioactive atoms and a carrier, which varies widely depending on the purpose of the scan. Some tracers can interact with specific proteins or sugars in the body, and some can even use the patient's own cells. The tracer can determine whether the patient will receive PET or SPECT imaging. Therefore, the main difference between SPECT and PET is the type of radiotracer used.
Radiolabeled Dendrimers for Nuclear Medicine Diagnosis
Recent advances in nuclear medicine diagnostics are exploring nanocarriers for targeted delivery of various radionuclides in specific ways to improve diagnosis and disease treatment. Nanotechnology promises to revolutionize the field of medicine, especially for the development of radiotracers. Recent advances in nanomedicine have shown that a variety of radionuclide-labeled nanoparticles (NPs), such as liposomes, micelles, and dendrimers, can be used for nuclear medicine diagnostics. Among them, dendrimers have attracted great attention due to their highly molecular interior, well-defined structure, and abundant surface functional groups, allowing dendritic macromolecules not only to be labeled using various radionuclides but also to construct different multifunctional nanomaterials for different nuclear medicine applications. Dendrimers can be labeled with radionuclides for PET and SPECT imaging after coupling with chelating agents.
Dendrimers can be used as versatile scaffolds for constructing a variety of PET imaging agents, and their unique structural properties allow for targeted functional modifications of the ligands. When constructing PET imaging agents from dendrimers, isotopes and effective radiolabeling strategies must be considered. Several radiolabeling methods with different isotopes have been successfully developed.
SPECT imagers have a γ camera detector that detects γ radiation emission from the radiotracer in the patient's body, enabling three-dimensional imaging. SPECT is primarily used to diagnose and follow the progression of heart disease and brain tumors. Dendritic macromolecules labeled with radionuclides 99mTc, 111In and 125I can be used for SPECT imaging.
Self-assembling dendrimer nanosystems based on the amphiphilic dendrimers 1 and 2 bearing radionuclide, for PET and SPECT imaging of tumors, respectively. (Ding L, et al., 2019)
Although a variety of radioisotope-labeled dendrimers based on radioisotopes are available to be designed for nuclear medicine diagnostics, further research is still relevant due to the many challenges and obstacles in the synthesis process and clinical translation of radioisotope-labeled dendrimer platforms. For example, the development of different chelate molecules to couple dendrimers to label a wide variety of radioisotopes to give higher radiochemical yields and stability.
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Reference
- Ding L.; et al. A self-assembling amphiphilic dendrimer nanotracer for SPECT imaging. Chem Commun (Camb). 2019, 56: 301-304.
For research use only. Not for clinical use.
