Tissue injuries often result in fibrogenesis, a process involving the development of an extracellular matrix that results in scars. While it can be viewed on the exterior of the body, currently there are no noninvasive methods to track the progress of fibrogenesis within the body’s interior. A team of researchers at Harvard Medical School have now developed a chemical probe that can be used to spot and quantify the amount of fibrogenesis using MRI scanners.
The probe is a gadolinium chelate (GdOA) which binds to allysine, an amino acid that’s present where collagen is creating connections. It concentrates at particularly high quantities where a great deal of fibrogenesis takes place, but doesn’t when a disease has stabilized. The gadolinium has an oxyamine functional group that binds to allysine, and because gadolinium is well visible under MRI, it highlights the locations of fibrogenesis.
In addition to clinical applications, this new probe will help to study diseases and injuries that involve fibrogenesis, potentially leading to new therapies and preventive strategies.
Study in journal Angewandte Chemie: Molecular Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Lung Fibrogenesis with an Oxyamine-Based Probe…
Via: Wiley…
