^99mTc-(tricine)-HYNIC-Lys-FROP Peptide for Breast Tumor Targeting

Breast cancer is a malignant disease with high mortality rate among women in the world. It is necessary to diagnose breast cancer at the early stage before it metastasizes in patients.

The aim of this study is the evaluation of 99mTc-(tricine)-HYNIC-Lys-FROP for breast tumor imaging.

Lys-FROP peptide was labeled with 99mTc using HYNIC as chelator and tricine as co-ligand. Specific binding of this radiolabeled peptide on breast cancerous cell was assessed in different cell lines as well as in tumor-bearing mice.

HYNIC-Lys-FROP peptide was labeled with 99mTc at radiochemical purity more than 99%. It was observed high stability in normal saline and serum about 95%. The highest cellular uptake was observed in MCF-7 breast tumor cells treated with 99mTc-(tricine)-HYNIC-Lys-FROP as compared to other cell lines (lung, ovarian, T47D breast cancer cell lines). Biodistribution results in female MCF-7 tumor-bearing mice showed the relatively high tumor uptake and tumor-muscle ratio as 3.82 ± 0.66 after 15 min post-injection of 99mTc-(tricine)- HYNIC-Lys-FROP. Tumor uptake was reduced in mice that were co-injected with excess of unlabeled peptide to be 0.91 ± 0.08.

Findings showed this radiolabeled peptide is a promising candidate for tumor targeting and molecular imaging of breast cancer.