A New Class of Smart Gadolinium Contrast Agent for Tissue pH Probing Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging

• Published in: Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 25; no. 7; p. 1513
• Main Authors: Mouffouk, Fouzi, Serrai, Hacene, Bhaduri, Sourav, Achten, Rik, Seyyedhamzeh, Mozhdeh, Husain, Ali A, Alhendal, Abdullah, Zourob, Mohammed
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI 26-03-2020; MDPI AG
• Subjects: Animals; cancer imaging; Chemistry Techniques, Synthetic; Contrast Media - chemical synthesis; Contrast Media - chemistry; Contrast Media - metabolism; Disease Models, Animal; Gadolinium - chemistry; Gadolinium - metabolism; Humans; Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; Magnetic Resonance Imaging - methods; Mice; Models, Chemical; Molecular Structure; mri; Neoplasms - diagnostic imaging; Neoplasms - metabolism; Organ Specificity; sensors; Tissue Distribution; pH; sensors; MRI; cancer imaging
• ISSN: 1420-3049; 1420-3049
• DOI: 10.3390/molecules25071513

Detecting tissue pH in vivo is extremely vital for medical diagnosis and formulation of treatment decisions. To this end, many investigations have been carried out to develop an accurate and efficient method of in vivo pH measurement. Most of the techniques developed so far suffer from inadequate accuracy, due to poor sensitivity at low concentration of the target or nonspecific interactions within the tissue matrix. To overcome these issues, we describe herein the development of a simple, yet reliable, way to estimate pH with high precision using a Gd(III)-DOTA-silyl-based acid-labile group as a pH-sensitive contrast agent with Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). With this method, a change in T1 weighted image intensity of the newly developed pH-sensitive contrast is directly linked to the proton concentration in the media. As a result, we were able estimate the pH of the target with 95% reliability.