Jacobs A H, Winkeler A, Dittmar C, Hilker R, Heiss W D
Max Planck-Institute for Neurological Research, Center of Molecular Medicine (ZMMK), Cologne, Germany.
J Cell Biochem Suppl. 2002;39:98-109. doi: 10.1002/jcb.10414.
Molecular imaging aims towards the non-invasive kinetic and quantitative assessment and localization of biological processes of normal and diseased cells in vivo in animal models and humans. Due to technological advances during the past years, imaging of molecular processes is a rapidly growing field, which has the potential of broad applications in the study of cell biology, biochemistry, gene/protein function and regulation, signal transduction, characterization of transgenic animals, development of new treatment strategies (gene or cell-based) and their successful implementation into clinical application. Most importantly, the possibility to study these parameters in the same subject repeatedly over time makes molecular imaging an attractive technology to obtain reliable data and to safe recourse; for example, molecular imaging enables the assessment of an exogenously introduced therapeutic gene and the related alterations of endogenously regulated gene functions directly in the same subject. Therefore, molecular imaging will have great implications especially when molecular diagnostic and treatment modalities have to be translated from experimental into clinical application. Here, we review the three main imaging technologies, which have been developed for studying molecular processes in vivo, the disease models, which have been studied so far, and the potential future applications.
分子成像旨在对动物模型和人体体内正常及病变细胞的生物学过程进行非侵入性的动力学和定量评估及定位。由于过去几年的技术进步,分子过程成像已成为一个快速发展的领域,在细胞生物学、生物化学、基因/蛋白质功能与调控、信号转导、转基因动物表征、新治疗策略(基于基因或细胞)的开发及其在临床应用中的成功实施等研究方面具有广泛应用潜力。最重要的是,能够在同一受试者身上随时间反复研究这些参数,使得分子成像成为获取可靠数据和安全追索的有吸引力的技术;例如,分子成像能够直接在同一受试者体内评估外源性引入的治疗基因以及内源性调控基因功能的相关改变。因此,特别是在分子诊断和治疗方式必须从实验转化为临床应用时,分子成像将具有重大意义。在此,我们综述了为研究体内分子过程而开发的三种主要成像技术、迄今为止所研究的疾病模型以及潜在的未来应用。