Department of Medicine, University of Colorado School of Medicine, Aurora, CO, USA.
Mol Imaging. 2012 Jun;11(3):251-64.
Molecular imaging methods allow the noninvasive detection and localization of specific molecules. Agents that report on molecular disease biomarkers can be used to diagnose and monitor disease. Many inflammatory diseases have molecular signatures within altered tissues. Although tissue biopsy is still the gold standard for detecting these signatures, several molecular imaging markers have been developed. Pharmacologic agents that block specific immune molecules have recently entered the clinic, and these drugs have already transformed the way we care for patients with immune-mediated diseases. The use of immunomodulatory drugs is usually guided by clinical assessment of the patient's response. Unfortunately, clinical assessment may miss the signs of inflammation, and many of the serologic markers of immune-mediated diseases correlate poorly with the underlying inflammatory activity within target tissues. Molecular imaging methods have the potential to improve our ability to detect and characterize tissue inflammation. We discuss some of the molecular signatures of immune activation and review molecular imaging methods that have been developed to detect active tissue inflammation.
分子成像方法可实现对特定分子的非侵入性检测和定位。可用于诊断和监测疾病的报告分子疾病生物标志物的试剂。许多炎症性疾病在改变的组织内具有分子特征。尽管组织活检仍然是检测这些特征的金标准，但已经开发出了几种分子成像标记物。最近，几种阻断特定免疫分子的药物已进入临床应用，这些药物已经改变了我们治疗免疫介导性疾病患者的方式。免疫调节药物的使用通常是根据患者对药物的反应进行临床评估。不幸的是，临床评估可能会错过炎症的迹象，而且许多免疫介导性疾病的血清学标志物与目标组织内潜在的炎症活动相关性较差。分子成像方法有可能提高我们检测和描述组织炎症的能力。我们讨论了一些免疫激活的分子特征，并回顾了已开发用于检测活跃组织炎症的分子成像方法。
