scholarly journals Maximizing response to intratumoral immunotherapy in mice by tuning local retention

2022 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Noor Momin ◽  
Joseph R. Palmeri ◽  
Emi A. Lutz ◽  
Noor Jailkhani ◽  
Howard Mak ◽  
...  

AbstractDirect injection of therapies into tumors has emerged as an administration route capable of achieving high local drug exposure and strong anti-tumor response. A diverse array of immune agonists ranging in size and target are under development as local immunotherapies. However, due to the relatively recent adoption of intratumoral administration, the pharmacokinetics of locally-injected biologics remains poorly defined, limiting rational design of tumor-localized immunotherapies. Here we define a pharmacokinetic framework for biologics injected intratumorally that can predict tumor exposure and effectiveness. We find empirically and computationally that extending the tumor exposure of locally-injected interleukin-2 by increasing molecular size and/or improving matrix-targeting affinity improves therapeutic efficacy in mice. By tracking the distribution of intratumorally-injected proteins using positron emission tomography, we observe size-dependent enhancement in tumor exposure occurs by slowing the rate of diffusive escape from the tumor and by increasing partitioning to an apparent viscous region of the tumor. In elucidating how molecular weight and matrix binding interplay to determine tumor exposure, our model can aid in the design of intratumoral therapies to exert maximal therapeutic effect.

Diagnostics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 1041
Author(s):  
Jun Nakata ◽  
Kayako Isohashi ◽  
Yoshihiro Oka ◽  
Hiroko Nakajima ◽  
Soyoko Morimoto ◽  
...  

Assessment of tumor response during treatment is one of the most important purposes of imaging. Before the appearance of immunotherapy, response evaluation criteria in solid tumors (RECIST) and positron emission tomography response criteria in solid tumors (PERCIST) were, respectively, the established morphologic and metabolic response criteria, and cessation of treatment was recommended when progressive disease was detected according to these criteria. However, various types of immunotherapy have been developed over the past 20 years, which show novel false positive findings on images, as well as distinct response patterns from conventional therapies. Antitumor immune response itself causes 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) uptake in tumor sites, known as “flare phenomenon”, so that positron emission tomography using FDG can no longer accurately identify remaining tumors. Furthermore, tumors often initially increase, followed by stability or decrease resulting from immunotherapy, which is called “pseudoprogression”, so that progressive disease cannot be confirmed by computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging at a single time point. As a result, neither RECIST nor PERCIST can accurately predict the response to immunotherapy, and therefore several new response criteria fixed for immunotherapy have been proposed. However, these criteria are still controversial, and also require months for response confirmation. The establishment of optimal response criteria and the development of new imaging technologies other than FDG are therefore urgently needed. In this review, we summarize the false positive images and the revision of response criteria for each immunotherapy, in order to avoid discontinuation of a truly effective immunotherapy.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zaniah N. Gonzalez-Galofre ◽  
Carlos J. Alcaide-Corral ◽  
Adriana A. S. Tavares

Abstract18F-sodium fluoride (18F-NaF) is a positron emission tomography (PET) radiotracer widely used in skeletal imaging and has also been proposed as a biomarker of active calcification in atherosclerosis. Like most PET radiotracers, 18F-NaF is typically administered intravenously. However in small animal research intravenous administrations can be challenging, because partial paravenous injection is common due to the small calibre of the superficial tail veins and repeat administrations via tail veins can lead to tissue injury therefore limiting the total number of longitudinal scanning points. In this paper, the feasibility of using intra-peritoneal route of injection of 8F-NaF to study calcification in mice was studied by looking at the kinetic and uptake profiles of normal soft tissues and bones versus intra-vascular injections. Dynamic PET was performed for 60 min on nineteen isoflurane-anesthetized male Swiss mice after femoral artery (n = 7), femoral vein (n = 6) or intraperitoneal (n = 6) injection of 8F-NaF. PET data were reconstructed and the standardised uptake value (SUV) and standardised uptake value ratio (SUVr) were estimated from the last three frames between 45- and 60-min and 8F-NaF uptake constant (Ki) was derived by Patlak graphical analysis. In soft tissue, the 18F-NaF perfusion phase changes depending on the type on injection route, whereas the uptake phase is similar regardless of the administration route. In bone tissue SUV, SUVr and Ki measures were not significantly different between the three administration routes. Comparison between PET and CT measures showed that bones that had the highest CT density displayed the lowest PET activity and conversely, bones where CT units were low had high 8F-NaF uptake. Intraperitoneal injection is a valid and practical alternative to the intra-vascular injections in small-animal 18F-NaF PET imaging providing equivalent pharmacokinetic data. CT outcome measures report on sites of stablished calcification whereas PET measures sites of higher complexity and active calcification.


Biomolecules ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (9) ◽  
pp. 421 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jongdoo Lim ◽  
Bing Guan ◽  
Kien Nham ◽  
Guiyang Hao ◽  
Xiankai Sun ◽  
...  

Various glutamate urea ligands have displayed high affinities to prostate specific membrane antigen (PSMA), which is highly overexpressed in prostate and other cancer sites. The multivalent versions of small PSMA-targeted molecules are known to be even more efficiently bound to the receptor. Here, we employ a well-known urea-based ligand, 2-[3-(1,3-dicarboxypropyl)-ureido] pentanedioic acid (DUPA) and triazine dendrimers in order to study the effect of molecular size on multivalent targeting in prostate cancer. The synthetic route starts with the preparation of a dichlorotriazine bearing DUPA in 67% overall yield over five steps. This dichlorotriazine reacts with G1, G3, and G5 triazine dendrimers bearing a 1,4,7,10-tetraazacyclododecane-1,4,7,10-tetraacetic acid (DOTA) group for 64Cu-labeling at the core to afford poly(monochlorotriazine) intermediates. Addition of 4-aminomethylpiperidine (4-AMP) and the following deprotection produce the target compounds, G1-(DUPA)4, G3-(DUPA)16, and G5-(DUPA)64. These targets include 4/16/64 DUPA groups on the surface and a DOTA group at the core, respectively. In vitro cell assay using PC3-PIP (PSMA positive) and PC3-FLU (PSMA negative) cells reveals that G1-(DUPA)4 has the highest PC3-PIP to PC3-FLU uptake ratio (10-fold) through the PSMA-mediated specific uptake. While G5-(DUPA)64 displayed approximately 12 times higher binding affinity (IC50 23.6 nM) to PC3-PIP cells than G1-(DUPA)4 (IC50 282.3 nM) as evaluated in a competitive binding assay, the G5 dendrimer also showed high non-specific binding to PC3-FLU cells. In vivo uptake of the 64Cu-labeled dendrimers was also evaluated in severe combined inmmunodeficient (SCID) mice bearing PC3-PIP and PC3-FLU xenografts on each shoulder, respectively. Interestingly, quantitative imaging analysis of positron emission tomograph (PET) displayed the lowest tumor uptake in PC3-PIP cells for the midsize dendrimer G3-(DUPA)16 (19.4 kDa) (0.66 ± 0.15%ID/g at 1 h. p.i., 0.64 ± 0.11%ID/g at 4 h. p.i., and 0.67 ± 0.08%ID/g at 24 h. p.i.). Through the specific binding of G1-(DUPA)4 to PSMA, the smallest dendrimer (5.1 kDa) demonstrated the highest PC3-PIP to muscle and PC3-PIP to PC3-FLU uptake ratios (17.7 ± 5.5 and 6.7 ± 3.0 at 4 h p.i., respectively). In addition, the enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect appeared to be an overwhelming factor for tumor uptake of the largest dendrimer G5-(DUPA)64 as the uptake was at a similar level irrelevant to the PSMA expression.


Biomedicines ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 371
Author(s):  
Noboru Oriuchi ◽  
Shigeyasu Sugawara ◽  
Tohru Shiga

Therapeutic response is evaluated using the diameter of tumors and quantitative parameters of 2-[18F] fluoro-2-deoxy-d-glucose positron emission tomography (FDG-PET). Tumor response to molecular-targeted drugs and immune checkpoint inhibitors is different from conventional chemotherapy in terms of temporal metabolic alteration and morphological change after the therapy. Cancer stem cells, immunologically competent cells, and metabolism of cancer are considered targets of novel therapy. Accumulation of FDG reflects the glucose metabolism of cancer cells as well as immune cells in the tumor microenvironment, which differs among patients according to the individual immune function; however, FDG-PET could evaluate the viability of the tumor as a whole. On the other hand, specific imaging and cell tracking of cancer cell or immunological cell subsets does not elucidate tumor response in a complexed interaction in the tumor microenvironment. Considering tumor heterogeneity and individual variation in therapeutic response, a radiomics approach with quantitative features of multimodal images and deep learning algorithm with reference to pathologic and genetic data has the potential to improve response assessment for emerging cancer therapy.


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