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Registered Bioimaging of Nanomaterials for Diagnostic and Therapeutic Monitoring

Registered Bioimaging of Nanomaterials for Diagnostic and Therapeutic Monitoring

Published on: December 9, 2010

MRI biosensors: a short primer.

Angelique Louie¹

¹Department of Biomedical Engineering, UC Davis, Davis, California 95616, USA. aylouie@ucdavis.edu

Journal of Magnetic Resonance Imaging : JMRI

|September 3, 2013

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Researchers explore MRI contrast agents that act as biosensors, turning "on" with specific biological activity. This tutorial covers principles for designing these activatable agents for molecular imaging.

Keywords:

activatable probes relaxation agents tutorial

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Area of Science:

Biomedical Imaging
Molecular Imaging
Contrast Agent Development

Background:

The development of activatable MRI contrast agents revolutionized molecular imaging.
These agents function as biosensors, responding to specific biological activities.
Interest in these agents surged approximately 20 years ago.

Purpose of the Study:

To provide an overview of the principles behind designing biosensing MRI contrast agents.
To explain mechanisms for creating T1 and T2 contrast agents that act as sensors.
To illustrate activation mechanisms with examples from recent literature.

Main Methods:

Describing mechanisms for MRI contrast agent activation.
Presenting examples of biological activities that interact with contrast agents.
Illustrating primary mechanisms of action for agent activation.

Main Results:

MRI sensors for pH, ion binding, enzyme cleavage, and oxidation-reduction are presented.
Mechanisms for T1 and T2 contrast agent sensing are discussed.
Specific examples demonstrate how activation is achieved.

Conclusions:

Activatable MRI contrast agents offer powerful tools for molecular imaging.
Understanding design principles is key to developing effective biosensing agents.
This primer illustrates fundamental concepts in MRI contrast agent activation.