Micro-Slab Coil Design for Hyperpolarized Metabolic Flux Analysis in Multiple Samples

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Molecular Imaging
• Cancer Metabolism

Background:

• Abnormal cellular metabolism is a key characteristic of cancer.
• Metabolic alterations often precede other cellular changes during cancer drug treatment.
• Metabolic flux analysis holds potential for cancer detection and monitoring treatment efficacy.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop an advanced Magnetic Resonance (MR)-based sensing technology for enhanced metabolic flux analysis in cancer cells.
• To overcome the limitations of low sensitivity and throughput in existing hyperpolarized MR techniques.
• To enable simultaneous, real-time, non-destructive quantification of metabolic dynamics in multiple samples.

Main Methods:

• Development of a miniaturized MR coil, the micro-slab MR coil, for multi-sample analysis.
• Utilizing hyperpolarized probes for real-time metabolic flux quantification.
• Application of the system to measure pyruvate-to-lactate flux in leukemic cell lines.

Main Results:

• Simultaneous, non-destructive quantification of pyruvate-to-lactate flux in two distinct leukemic cell lines.
• Rapid assessment of metabolic flux changes in response to drug treatment within a single experiment.
• Demonstration of a novel multi-sample system for high-throughput metabolic analysis.

Conclusions:

• The micro-slab MR coil significantly improves the sensitivity and throughput of metabolic flux analysis.
• This technology enables simultaneous monitoring of metabolic dynamics in multiple samples, accelerating drug response assessment.
• The developed system offers a transformative approach for large-scale assessment of cancer cell metabolic dynamics.