In Vivo Live Imaging of Bone Using Shortwave Infrared Fluorescence Quantum Dots
Abstract Bone is playing an increasingly critical role in human health and disease. More noninvasive multi-scale imaging techniques are urgently required for investigations on the substructures and biological functions of bones. Our results firstly revealed that our prepared SWIR QDs acted as a bone-specific image contrast to achieve real-time imaging of bone structures both in vivo and ex vivo. The major bone structures of both Balb/C nude mouse and Balb/C mouse including the skull, spine, pelvis, limbs and the sternum could be rapidly and gradually identified via blood circulation after QDs injection in vivo. More importantly, the binding capability of our QDs mainly depend on the biological activities of bone tissues, suggesting our technique was suitable for in vivo live imaging. Additionally, the cell imaging results suggested that the potential mechanism of our bone imaging could be ascribed to the highly specific interaction between QDs and MC3T3-E1 cells. In a word, skeletal structures and biological activities of bones are anticipated to be observed and monitored with this QDs-guided SWIR imaging strategy, respectively. This radiation-free QDs-guided SWIR live imaging of bone can put new insights into a comprehensive study of bones in vivo and provide basis for early diagnosis of bone diseases.