Robust surface coating for a fast, facile fluorine-18 labeling of iron oxide nanoparticles for PET/MR dual-modality imaging

• Published in: Nanoscale Vol. 8; no. 47; pp. 19644 - 19653
• Main Authors: Sun, Ziyan, Cheng, Kai, Wu, Fengyu, Liu, Hongguang, Ma, Xiaowei, Su, Xinhui, Liu, Yang, Xia, Liming, Cheng, Zhen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Royal Society of Chemistry 01.01.2016
• Subjects: NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY
• ISSN: 2040-3364; 2040-3372
• DOI: 10.1039/C6NR07298D

Grafting a robust organic shell around inorganic nanoparticles can optimize their colloidal features to dramatically improve their physicochemical properties. Here, we have developed a polymer coating procedure for providing colloidal stability to the nanoparticles and, more importantly, for applying a fast, facile fluorine-18 labeling of iron oxide nanoparticles (IONPs) for positron emission tomography (PET)/magnetic resonance (MR) dual-modality imaging. The structure of the amphiphilic polymer is based on a backbone of polyacrylic acid, conjugated with multiple oleylamines to form a comb-like branched structure. The dense polymer shell provides high colloidal stability to the IONPs against harsh conditions such as high temperature, low pH value, and high ion strength. By incorporating a 1,4,7-triazacyclononane (NOTA) chelator to the comb-like amphiphilic polymer for the chelation of aluminum fluoride ions, we applied a one-step radiolabeling approach for a fast, facile radiofluorination of magnetic nanoparticles. The new strategy can significantly reduce the procedure time and radiation exposure. The PET/MR dual modality imaging was successfully achieved in living subjects by using F labeled magnetic nanoparticles.