Assessing intrarenal nonperfusion and vascular leakage in acute kidney injury with multinuclear (1) H/(19) F MRI and perfluorocarbon nanoparticles.
OBJECTIVE
We sought to develop a unique sensor-reporter approach for functional kidney imaging that employs circulating perfluorocarbon nanoparticles and multinuclear (1) H/(19) F MRI.


METHODS
(19) F spin density weighted and T1 weighted images were used to generate quantitative functional mappings of both healthy and ischemia-reperfusion (acute kidney injury) injured mouse kidneys. (1) H blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) MRI was also employed as a supplementary approach to facilitate the comprehensive analysis of renal circulation and its pathological changes in acute kidney injury.


RESULTS
Heterogeneous blood volume distributions and intrarenal oxygenation gradients were confirmed in healthy kidneys by (19) F MRI. In a mouse model of acute kidney injury, (19) F MRI, in conjunction with blood-oxygenation-level-dependent MRI, sensitively delineated renal vascular damage and recovery. In the cortico-medullary junction region, we observed 25% lower (19) F signal (P < 0.05) and 70% longer (1) H T2* (P < 0.01) in injured kidneys compared with contralateral kidneys at 24 h after initial ischemia-reperfusion injury. We also detected 71% higher (19) F signal (P < 0.01) and 40% lower (1) H T2* (P < 0.05) in the renal medulla region of injured kidneys compared with contralateral uninjured kidneys.


CONCLUSIONS
Integrated (1) H/(19) F MRI using perfluorocarbon nanoparticles provides a multiparametric readout of regional perfusion defects in acutely injured kidneys.
Department of Physics, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri, USA.
Lingzhi
L
Hu
Junjie
J
Chen
Xiaoxia
X
Yang
Angana
A
Senpan
John S
JS
Allen
Noriko
N
Yanaba
Shelton D
SD
Caruthers
Gregory M
GM
Lanza
Marc R
MR
Hammerman
Samuel A
SA
Wickline
D058186:Acute Kidney Injury / Q000473:pathology*; D000818:Animals; D001810:Blood Volume; D002138:Calibration; D005461:Fluorine; D005466:Fluorocarbons / Q000138:chemical synthesis; D007668:Kidney / Q000098:blood supply*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D051379:Mice; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D053758:Nanoparticles; D010100:Oxygen / Q000097:blood*; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D015427:Reperfusion Injury / Q000473:pathology*
D005466:Fluorocarbons; D005461:Fluorine; D010100:Oxygen
blood volume; fluorine; ischemia-reperfusion; kidney; oxygenation; perfusion