In vivo detection of cancer biomarkers using fluorescence lifetime imaging

Wednesday, October 26, 2011 — Poster Session III
10:00 a.m. – Noon	Natcher Conference Center	NICHD	IMAG-3

Authors

• Y Ardeshirpour
• R Zielinski
• V Chernomordik
• J Capala
• G Griffiths
• A Gandjbakhche
• M Hassan

Abstract

The major goal on developing drugs targeting specific tumor receptors, such as Monoclonal AntiBodies (MAB), is to make a drug compound that targets selectively the cancer-causing biomarkers, inhibit their functionality and/or deliver the toxin specifically to the malignant cells. Recent advances in MAB show that their efficacy depends strongly on characterization of tumor biomarkers. Therefore, one of the main tasks in cancer diagnostics and treatment is to develop non-invasive in-vivo imaging modalities for detection of cancer biomarkers and monitoring their down regulation during the treatment. Such methods can potentially result in a new image and treat paradigm for cancer therapy. In this study we have demonstrated for the first time in live animal that the fluorescence lifetime can be used to detect the binding of targeted optical probes to the extracellular receptors on tumor cells in vivo. We attached Near-InfraRed (NIR) fluorescent probes to Human Epidermal Growth Factor 2 (HER2/neu) specific affibody molecules and used our time-resolved optical system to compare the fluorescence lifetime of the optical probes that were bound and unbound to tumor cells in live mice. The results show that the fluorescence lifetime changes in our model system delineate HER2 receptor bound from the unbound probe in-vivo.

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