Dorit Granot1, Erik M. Shapiro1,2
1Department of Diagnostic
Radiology, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, United States; 2Department
of Biomedical Engineering, Yale University, New Haven, CT, United States
In vivo labeling of endogenous neuroblasts in brain is an established method for tracking native cell migration in vivo. MPIOs are injected into the lateral cerebral ventricle proximal to the neural stem cell niche and are endocytosed by neural progenitor cells, making them visible by T2* weighted MRI. However, the in vivo efficiency of MPIO uptake into stem and progenitor cells remains low. We have previously demonstrated that enhanced cell labeling can be achieved in culture using a mixture of MPIOs and transfection agent. Here we extend this method to enhance in vivo MRI detection of migrating precursor stem cells.
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