Mapping the Systemic Recruitment of Ferritin Expressing Fibroblasts to the Angiogenic Rim of Ovarian Tumors

Moriel Vandsburger¹, Batya Cohen¹, Yoseph Addadi¹, Marina Radoul¹, Michal Neeman¹

Recruitment of fibroblasts by solid tumors plays a critical role in initiation, progression and metastatic dissemination. As such, cancer associated fibroblasts are attractive as potential avenues for novel anti-cancer therapies. MRI of fibroblast recruitment could enable assessment of drug efficacy on the cellular level, but is hindered by limitations of cell labeling techniques. We examined the potential of ferritin over-expression for quantitative MRI tracking of fibroblasts recruitment to human ovarian carcinoma both In Vitro, and in vivo. Our results indicate even under conditions of sparse populations of tagged cells, over-expression of ferritin can be used for quantitative cell tracking.