| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
|
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||||
Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, Crump Institute for Molecular Imaging and the Department of Energy Laboratory of Structural Biology and Molecular Medicine, School of Medicine, UCLA, Los Angeles, California
Correspondence: For correspondence or reprints contact: Michael E. Phelps, PhD, Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, School of Medicine, UCLA, Box 951735, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1735.
ABSTRACT
PET and SPECT are molecular imaging techniques that use radiolabeled molecules to image molecular interactions of biological processes in vivo. PET imaging technologies have been developed to provide a pathway to the patient from the experimental paradigms of biological and pharmaceutical sciences in genetically engineered and tissue transplanted mouse models of disease. PET provides a novel way for molecular therapies and molecular diagnostics to come together in the discovery of molecules that can be used in low mass amounts to image the function of a target and, by elevating the mass, to pharmacologically modify the function of the target. In both cases, the molecules are the same or analogs of each other. PET can be used to titrate drugs to their sites of action within organ systems in vivo and to assay biological outcomes of the processes being modified in the mouse and the patient. The goal is to provide a novel way to improve the rates of discovery and approval of radiopharmaceuticals and Pharmaceuticals. Extending this relationship into clinical practice can improve drug use by providing molecular diagnostics in concert with molecular therapeutics. Diseases are biological processes, and molecular imaging with PET is sensitive and informative to these processes. This sensitivity is exemplified by the detection of disease with PET without evidence of anatomic changes on CT and MRI. These biological changes are seen early in the course of disease, even in asymptomatic stages, as illustrated by the metabolic abnormalities detected with PET and FDG in Huntingdon's and familial Alzheimer's diseases 7 and 5 y, respectively, before symptoms appear. Differentiation of viable from nonviable tissue is fundamentally a metabolic question, as shown by the use of PET to differentiate patients with coronary artery disease who will benefit from revascularization from those who will not. Although beginning within a specific organ, cancer is a systemic disease the most devastating consequences of which result from metasta-ses. Whole-body PET imaging with FDG enables inspection of glucose metabolism in all organ systems in a single examination to improve the detection and staging of cancer, selection of therapy, and assessment of therapeutic response. In lung and colorectal cancers, melanoma, and lymphoma, PET FDG improves the accuracy of detection and staging from 8% to 43% over conventional work-ups and results in treatment changes in 20%-40% of the patients, depending on the clinical question. Approximately 65% are upstaged because unsuspected metasta-ses are detected, and 35% are downstaged because a structural diagnosis of lesions is changed from malignant to benign. Similar results are now being shown for other cancers. The main difference between CT, sonography, MRI, and PET or SPECT is not technologic but, rather, a difference between detecting and characterizing a disease by its anatomic features as opposed to its biology. The importance and success of developing new molecular imaging probes is increasing as PET becomes integral to the study of the integrative mammalian biology of disease and as molecular therapies targeting the biological processes of disease are developed.
Key Words: PET • molecular imaging • cancer • neurological disease • cardiovascular disease • imaging gene expression
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|
 |
|
  H. Wu, D. Pal, T. Y. Song, J. A. O'Sullivan, and Y.-C. Tai Micro Insert: A Prototype Full-Ring PET Device for Improving the Image Resolution of a Small-Animal PET Scanner J. Nucl. Med., October 1, 2008; 49(10): 1668 - 1676. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 D. A. Harki, N. Satyamurthy, D. B. Stout, M. E. Phelps, and P. B. Dervan In vivo imaging of pyrrole-imidazole polyamides with positron emission tomography PNAS, September 2, 2008; 105(35): 13039 - 13044. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
A. Desbree, M. Verdurand, J. Godart, A. Dubois, R. Mastrippolito, F. Pain, L. Pinot, T. Delzescaux, H. Gurden, L. Zimmer, et al. The Potential of a Radiosensitive Intracerebral Probe to Monitor 18F-MPPF Binding in Mouse Hippocampus In Vivo J. Nucl. Med., July 1, 2008; 49(7): 1155 - 1161. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
H. Wu, D. Pal, J. A. O'Sullivan, and Y.-C. Tai A Feasibility Study of a Prototype PET Insert Device to Convert a General-Purpose Animal PET Scanner to Higher Resolution J. Nucl. Med., January 1, 2008; 49(1): 79 - 87. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 K. D. EVANS, T. A. TULLOSS, and N. HALL 18FDG Uptake in Brown Fat: Potential for False Positives Radiol. Technol., May 1, 2007; 78(5): 361 - 366. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 E. R. McVeigh Emerging Imaging Techniques Circ. Res., April 14, 2006; 98(7): 879 - 886. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
L. M. Cher, C. Murone, N. Lawrentschuk, S. Ramdave, A. Papenfuss, A. Hannah, G. J. O'Keefe, J. I. Sachinidis, S. U. Berlangieri, G. Fabinyi, et al. Correlation of Hypoxic Cell Fraction and Angiogenesis with Glucose Metabolic Rate in Gliomas Using 18F-Fluoromisonidazole, 18F-FDG PET, and Immunohistochemical Studies J. Nucl. Med., March 1, 2006; 47(3): 410 - 418. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 M. Muller, A. dela Pena, and H. Derendorf Issues in Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics of Anti-Infective Agents: Distribution in Tissue Antimicrob. Agents Chemother., May 1, 2004; 48(5): 1441 - 1453. [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
G. Niu, A. W. Gaut, L. L. B. Ponto, R. D. Hichwa, M. T. Madsen, M. M. Graham, and F. E. Domann Multimodality Noninvasive Imaging of Gene Transfer Using the Human Sodium Iodide Symporter J. Nucl. Med., March 1, 2004; 45(3): 445 - 449. [Abstract] [Full Text]
|
|
|
|
|
|
A. Roivainen, T. Tolvanen, S. Salomaki, G. Lendvai, I. Velikyan, P. Numminen, M. Valila, H. Sipila, M. Bergstrom, P. Harkonen, et al. 68Ga-Labeled Oligonucleotides for In Vivo Imaging with PET J. Nucl. Med., February 1, 2004; 45(2): 347 - 355. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 J. C. Parker and M. I. Townsley Evaluation of lung injury in rats and mice Am J Physiol Lung Cell Mol Physiol, February 1, 2004; 286(2): L231 - L246. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 T.-C. Yen, K.-K. Ng, S.-Y. Ma, H.-H. Chou, C.-S. Tsai, S. Hsueh, T.-C. Chang, J.-H. Hong, L.-C. See, W.-J. Lin, et al. Value of Dual-Phase 2-Fluoro-2-Deoxy-D-Glucose Positron Emission Tomography in Cervical Cancer J. Clin. Oncol., October 1, 2003; 21(19): 3651 - 3658. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 M. F Lythgoe, N. R Sibson, and N. G Harris Neuroimaging of animal models of brain disease Br. Med. Bull., March 1, 2003; 65(1): 235 - 257. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 T. F. Massoud and S. S. Gambhir Molecular imaging in living subjects: seeing fundamental biological processes in a new light Genes & Dev., March 1, 2003; 17(5): 545 - 580. [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 G. Hargaden, M. O'Connell, E. Kavanagh, T. Powell, R. Ward, and S. Eustace Current Concepts in Whole-Body Imaging Using Turbo Short Tau Inversion Recovery MR Imaging Am. J. Roentgenol., January 1, 2003; 180(1): 247 - 252. [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
C. Nichol and E. E. Kim Molecular Imaging and Gene Therapy J. Nucl. Med., September 1, 2001; 42(9): 1368 - 1374. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 J. C. Mazziotta Imaging: Window on the Brain Arch Neurol, October 1, 2000; 57(10): 1413 - 1421. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
M. E. Phelps Inaugural Article: Positron emission tomography provides molecular imaging of biological processes PNAS, August 1, 2000; 97(16): 9226 - 9233. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 B. J. Hillman and H. L. Neiman Translating Molecular Imaging Research into Radiologic Practice: Summary of the Proceedings of the American College of Radiology Colloquium, April 22-24, 2001 Radiology, January 1, 2002; 222(1): 19 - 24. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
| JOURNAL OF NUCLEAR MEDICINE TECHNOLOGY | THE JOURNAL OF NUCLEAR MEDICINE |
