scholarly journals Advances in [18F]Trifluoromethylation Chemistry for PET Imaging

Molecules ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (21) ◽  
pp. 6478
Author(s):  
Felix Francis ◽  
Frank Wuest

Positron emission tomography (PET) is a preclinical and clinical imaging technique extensively used to study and visualize biological and physiological processes in vivo. Fluorine-18 (18F) is the most frequently used positron emitter for PET imaging due to its convenient 109.8 min half-life, high yield production on small biomedical cyclotrons, and well-established radiofluorination chemistry. The presence of fluorine atoms in many drugs opens new possibilities for developing radioligands labelled with fluorine-18. The trifluoromethyl group (CF3) represents a versatile structural motif in medicinal and pharmaceutical chemistry to design and synthesize drug molecules with favourable pharmacological properties. This fact also makes CF3 groups an exciting synthesis target from a PET tracer discovery perspective. Early attempts to synthesize [18F]CF3-containing radiotracers were mainly hampered by low radiochemical yields and additional challenges such as low radiochemical purity and molar activity. However, recent innovations in [18F]trifluoromethylation chemistry have significantly expanded the chemical toolbox to synthesize fluorine-18-labelled radiotracers. This review presents the development of significant [18F]trifluoromethylation chemistry strategies to apply [18F]CF3-containing radiotracers in preclinical and clinical PET imaging studies. The continuous growth of PET as a crucial functional imaging technique in biomedical and clinical research and the increasing number of CF3-containing drugs will be the primary drivers for developing novel [18F]trifluoromethylation chemistry strategies in the future.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vegard Torp Lien ◽  
Emily Hauge ◽  
Syed Nuruddin ◽  
Jo Klaveness ◽  
Dag Erlend Olberg

<p>The tyrosine kinase MET (hepatocyte growth factor receptor) is abnormally activated in a wide range of cancers and is often correlated with a poor prognosis. Precision medicine with positron emission tomography (PET) can potentially aid in the assessment of tumor biochemistry and heterogeneity, which can prompt the selection of the most effective therapeutic regimes. The selective MET inhibitor PF04217903 (<b>1</b>) formed the basis for a bioisosteric replacement to the deoxyfluorinated analogue [<sup>18</sup>F]<b>2</b>, intended as a PET tracer for MET. [<sup>18</sup>F]<b>2 </b>could be synthesized with a “hydrous fluoroethylation” protocol in 6.3 ± 2.6% radiochemical yield and a molar activity of >50 GBq/µmol. <i>In vitro</i> autoradiography indicated that [<sup>18</sup>F]<b>2 </b>specifically binds to MET in PC3 tumor tissue, and <i>in vivo</i> biodistribution in mice showed predominantly a hepatobiliary excretion along with a low retention of radiotracer in other organs. </p>


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vegard Torp Lien ◽  
Emily Hauge ◽  
Syed Nuruddin ◽  
Jo Klaveness ◽  
Dag Erlend Olberg

<p>The tyrosine kinase MET (hepatocyte growth factor receptor) is abnormally activated in a wide range of cancers and is often correlated with a poor prognosis. Precision medicine with positron emission tomography (PET) can potentially aid in the assessment of tumor biochemistry and heterogeneity, which can prompt the selection of the most effective therapeutic regimes. The selective MET inhibitor PF04217903 (<b>1</b>) formed the basis for a bioisosteric replacement to the deoxyfluorinated analogue [<sup>18</sup>F]<b>2</b>, intended as a PET tracer for MET. [<sup>18</sup>F]<b>2 </b>could be synthesized with a “hydrous fluoroethylation” protocol in 6.3 ± 2.6% radiochemical yield and a molar activity of >50 GBq/µmol. <i>In vitro</i> autoradiography indicated that [<sup>18</sup>F]<b>2 </b>specifically binds to MET in PC3 tumor tissue, and <i>in vivo</i> biodistribution in mice showed predominantly a hepatobiliary excretion along with a low retention of radiotracer in other organs. </p>


2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean Tanzey ◽  
Xia Shao ◽  
Jenelle Stauff ◽  
Janna Arteaga ◽  
Phillip Sherman ◽  
...  

Positron emission tomography (PET) imaging of Colony Stimulating Factor 1 Receptor (CSF1R) is a new strategy for quantifying both neuroinflammation and inflammation in the periphery since CSF1R is expressed on microglia and macrophages. AZ683 has high affinity for CSF1R (Ki = 8 nM; IC50 = 6 nM) and >250-fold selectivity over 95 other kinases. In this paper, we report the radiosynthesis of [11C]AZ683 and initial evaluation of its use in CSF1R PET. [11C]AZ683 was synthesized by 11C-methylation of the desmethyl precursor with [11C]MeOTf in 3.0% non-corrected activity yield (based upon [11C]MeOTf), >99% radiochemical purity and high molar activity. Preliminary PET imaging with [11C]AZ683 revealed low brain uptake in rodents and nonhuman primates, suggesting that imaging neuroinflammation could be challenging but that the radiopharmaceutical could still be useful for peripheral imaging of inflammation.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (8) ◽  
pp. 745
Author(s):  
Jonathan Cotton ◽  
Chris Marc Goehring ◽  
Anna Kuehn ◽  
Andreas Maurer ◽  
Kerstin Fuchs ◽  
...  

The acidic hydrolase α-fucosidase (AF) is a biomarker for maladies such as cancer and inflammation. The most advanced probes for α-fucosidase are unfortunately constrained to ex vivo or in vitro applications. The in vivo detection and quantification of AF using positron emission tomography would allow for better discovery and diagnosis of disease as well as provide better understanding of disease progression. We synthesized, characterized, and evaluated a radiolabeled small molecule inhibitor of AF based on a known molecule. The radiosynthesis involved the 11C methylation of a phenoxide, which was generated in situ by ultrasonification of the precursor with sodium hydride. The tracer was produced with a decay corrected yield of 41.7 ± 16.5% and had a molar activity of 65.4 ± 30.3 GBq/μmol. The tracer was shown to be stable in mouse serum at 60 min. To test the new tracer, HCT116 colorectal carcinoma cells were engineered to overexpress human AF. In vitro evaluation revealed 3.5-fold higher uptake in HCT116AF cells compared to HCT116 controls (26.4 ± 7.8 vs. 7.5 ± 1.0 kBq/106 cells). Static PET scans 50 min post injection revealed 2.5-fold higher tracer uptake in the HCT116AF tumors (3.0 ± 0.8%ID/cc (n = 6)) compared with the controls (1.2 ± 0.8 (n = 5)). Dynamic scans showed higher uptake in the HCT116AF tumors at all time-points (n = 2). Ex vivo analysis of the tumors, utilizing fluorescent DDK2 antibodies, confirmed the expression of human AF in the HCT116AF xenografts. We have developed a novel PET tracer to image AF in vivo and will now apply this to relevant disease models.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (17) ◽  
pp. 4102-4112
Author(s):  
Lydia A. Perkins ◽  
Lea Nyiranshuti ◽  
Lynda Little-Ihrig ◽  
Joseph D. Latoche ◽  
Kathryn E. Day ◽  
...  

Abstract In sickle cell disease (SCD), very late antigen-4 (VLA-4 or integrin α4β1) mediates the adhesion of reticulocytes to inflamed, proinflammatory endothelium, a key process in promoting vaso-occlusive episodes (VOEs). We hypothesized that a radionuclide tracer targeting VLA-4 could be harnessed as a positron emission tomography (PET) imaging biomarker of VOEs. We tested the VLA-4 peptidomimetic PET tracer 64Cu-CB-TE1A1P-PEG4-LLP2A (64Cu-LLP2A) for imaging hyper-adhesion–associated VOEs in the SCD Townes mouse model. With lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced VOEs, 64Cu-LLP2A uptake was increased in the bone marrow of the humeri and femurs, common sites of VOEs in SCD mice compared with non-SCD mice. Treatment with a proven inhibitor of VOEs (the anti-mouse anti-P-selectin monoclonal antibody [mAb] RB40.34) during LPS stimulation led to a reduction in the uptake of 64Cu-LLP2A in the humeri and femurs to baseline levels, implying blockade of VOE hyper-adhesion. Flow cytometry with Cy3-LLP2A demonstrated an increased percentage of VLA-4–positive reticulocytes in SCD vs non-SCD mice in the bone and peripheral blood after treatment with LPS, which was abrogated by anti-P-selectin mAb treatment. These data, for the first time, show in vivo imaging of VLA-4–mediated hyper-adhesion, primarily of SCD reticulocytes, during VOEs. PET imaging with 64Cu-LLP2A may serve as a valuable, noninvasive method for identifying sites of vaso-occlusion and may provide an objective biomarker of disease severity and anti-P-selectin treatment efficacy in patients with SCD.


Author(s):  
Ksenia Lisova ◽  
Bao Ying Chen ◽  
Jia Wang ◽  
Kelly Mun-Ming Fong ◽  
Peter M. Clark ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Conventional scale production of small batches of PET tracers (e.g. for preclinical imaging) is an inefficient use of resources. Using O-(2-[18F]fluoroethyl)-L-tyrosine ([18F]FET), we demonstrate that simple microvolume radiosynthesis techniques can improve the efficiency of production by consuming tiny amounts of precursor, and maintaining high molar activity of the tracers even with low starting activity. Procedures The synthesis was carried out in microvolume droplets manipulated on a disposable patterned silicon “chip” affixed to a heater. A droplet of [18F]fluoride containing TBAHCO3 was first deposited onto a chip and dried at 100 °C. Subsequently, a droplet containing 60 nmol of precursor was added to the chip and the fluorination reaction was performed at 90 °C for 5 min. Removal of protecting groups was accomplished with a droplet of HCl heated at 90 °C for 3 min. Finally, the crude product was collected in a methanol-water mixture, purified via analytical-scale radio-HPLC and formulated in saline. As a demonstration, using [18F]FET produced on the chip, we prepared aliquots with different molar activities to explore the impact on preclinical PET imaging of tumor-bearing mice. Results The microdroplet synthesis exhibited an overall decay-corrected radiochemical yield of 55 ± 7% (n = 4) after purification and formulation. When automated, the synthesis could be completed in 35 min. Starting with < 370 MBq of activity, ~ 150 MBq of [18F]FET could be produced, sufficient for multiple in vivo experiments, with high molar activities (48–119 GBq/μmol). The demonstration imaging study revealed the uptake of [18F]FET in subcutaneous tumors, but no significant differences in tumor uptake as a result of molar activity differences (ranging 0.37–48 GBq/μmol) were observed. Conclusions A microdroplet synthesis of [18F]FET was developed demonstrating low reagent consumption, high yield, and high molar activity. The approach can be expanded to tracers other than [18F]FET, and adapted to produce higher quantities of the tracer sufficient for clinical PET imaging.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gengyang Yuan ◽  
Maeva Dhaynaut ◽  
Yu Lan ◽  
Nicolas J Guehl ◽  
Dalena Huynh ◽  
...  

Metabotropic glutamate receptor 2 (mGluR2) is a therapeutic target for the treatment of several neuropsychiatric disorders and conditions. The role of mGluR2 function in etiology could be unveiled by in vivo imaging using positron emission tomography (PET). In this regard, 5-(2-fluoro-4-[11C]methoxyphenyl)-2,2-dimethyl-3,4-dihydro-2H-pyrano[2,3-b]pyridine-7-carboxamide ([11C]13), a potent negative allosteric modulator (NAM), was developed to support this endeavor. Radioligand [11C]13 was synthesized via the O-[11C]methylation of phenol 24 with a high molar activity of 212 ± 76 GBq/µmol (n = 5) and excellent radiochemical purity (> 99%). PET imaging of [11C]13 in rats demonstrated its superior brain heterogeneity, particularly in the regions of striatum, thalamus, hippocampus, and cortex. Accumulation of [11C]13 in these regions of interest (ROIs) was reduced with pretreatment of mGluR2 NAMs, VU6001966 (9) and MNI-137 (26), the extent of which revealed a time-dependent drug effect of the blocking agents. In a nonhuman primate, [11C]13 selectively accumulated in mGluR2-rich regions, especially in different cortical areas, putamen, thalamus, and hippocampus, and resulted in high-contrast brain images. The regional total volume of distribution (VT) estimates of [11C]13 decreased by 14% after the pretreatment with 9. Therefore, [11C]13 is a potential candidate for translational PET imaging studies of mGluR2 function.


Author(s):  
Qinheng Zheng ◽  
Hongtao Xu ◽  
Hua Wang ◽  
Wen-Ge Han Du ◽  
Nan Wang ◽  
...  

The lack of simple, efficient [<sup>18</sup>F]fluorination processes and new target-specific organofluorine probes remains the major challenge of fluorine-18-based positron emission tomography (PET). We report here a fast isotopic exchange method for the radiosynthesis of aryl [<sup>18</sup>F]fluorosulfate based PET agents enabled by the emerging sulfur fluoride exchange (SuFEx) click chemistry. The method has been applied to the fully-automated <sup>18</sup>F-radiolabeling of twenty-five structurally diverse aryl fluorosulfates with excellent radiochemical yield (83–100%) and high molar activity (up to 281 GBq µmol<sup>–1</sup>) at room temperature in 30 seconds. The purification of radiotracers requires no time-consuming high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), but rather a simple cartridge filtration. The utility of aryl [<sup>18</sup>F]fluorosulfate is demonstrated by the <i>in vivo</i> tumor imaging by targeting poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase 1 (PARP1).


2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Velasco ◽  
Adriana Mota-Cobián ◽  
Jesús Mateo ◽  
Samuel España

Abstract Background Multi-tracer positron emission tomography (PET) imaging can be accomplished by applying multi-tracer compartment modeling. Recently, a method has been proposed in which the arterial input functions (AIFs) of the multi-tracer PET scan are explicitly derived. For that purpose, a gamma spectroscopic analysis is performed on blood samples manually withdrawn from the patient when at least one of the co-injected tracers is based on a non-pure positron emitter. Alternatively, these blood samples required for the spectroscopic analysis may be obtained and analyzed on site by an automated detection device, thus minimizing analysis time and radiation exposure of the operating personnel. In this work, a new automated blood sample detector based on silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) for single- and multi-tracer PET imaging is presented, characterized, and tested in vitro and in vivo. Results The detector presented in this work stores and analyzes on-the-fly single and coincidence detected events. A sensitivity of 22.6 cps/(kBq/mL) and 1.7 cps/(kBq/mL) was obtained for single and coincidence events respectively. An energy resolution of 35% full-width-half-maximum (FWHM) at 511 keV and a minimum detectable activity of 0.30 ± 0.08 kBq/mL in single mode were obtained. The in vivo AIFs obtained with the detector show an excellent Pearson’s correlation (r = 0.996, p < 0.0001) with the ones obtained from well counter analysis of discrete blood samples. Moreover, in vitro experiments demonstrate the capability of the detector to apply the gamma spectroscopic analysis on a mixture of 68Ga and 18F and separate the individual signal emitted from each one. Conclusions Characterization and in vivo evaluation under realistic experimental conditions showed that the detector proposed in this work offers excellent sensibility and stability. The device also showed to successfully separate individual signals emitted from a mixture of radioisotopes. Therefore, the blood sample detector presented in this study allows fully automatic AIFs measurements during single- and multi-tracer PET studies.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Krishna Kanta Ghosh ◽  
Parasuraman Padmanabhan ◽  
Chang-Tong Yang ◽  
Sachin Mishra ◽  
Christer Halldin ◽  
...  

Abstract Positron emission tomography (PET) offers the study of biochemical, physiological, and pharmacological functions at a cellular and molecular level. The performance of a PET study mostly depends on the used radiotracer of interest. However, the development of a novel PET tracer is very difficult, as it is required to fulfill a lot of important criteria. PET radiotracers usually encounter different chemical modifications including redox reaction, hydrolysis, decarboxylation, and various conjugation processes within living organisms. Due to this biotransformation, different chemical entities are produced, and the amount of the parent radiotracer is declined. Consequently, the signal measured by the PET scanner indicates the entire amount of radioactivity deposited in the tissue; however, it does not offer any indication about the chemical disposition of the parent radiotracer itself. From a radiopharmaceutical perspective, it is necessary to quantify the parent radiotracer’s fraction present in the tissue. Hence, the identification of radiometabolites of the radiotracers is vital for PET imaging. There are mainly two reasons for the chemical identification of PET radiometabolites: firstly, to determine the amount of parent radiotracers in plasma, and secondly, to rule out (if a radiometabolite enters the brain) or correct any radiometabolite accumulation in peripheral tissue. Besides, radiometabolite formations of the tracer might be of concern for the PET study, as the radiometabolic products may display considerably contrasting distribution patterns inside the body when compared with the radiotracer itself. Therefore, necessary information is needed about these biochemical transformations to understand the distribution of radioactivity throughout the body. Various published review articles on PET radiometabolites mainly focus on the sample preparation techniques and recently available technology to improve the radiometabolite analysis process. This article essentially summarizes the chemical and structural identity of the radiometabolites of various radiotracers including [11C]PBB3, [11C]flumazenil, [18F]FEPE2I, [11C]PBR28, [11C]MADAM, and (+)[18F]flubatine. Besides, the importance of radiometabolite analysis in PET imaging is also briefly summarized. Moreover, this review also highlights how a slight chemical modification could reduce the formation of radiometabolites, which could interfere with the results of PET imaging. Graphical abstract


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