title: Development of nanostars as a biocompatible tumor contrast agent: toward in vivo SERS imaging.
abstract: The need for sensitive imaging techniques to detect tumor cells is an important issue in cancer diagnosis and therapy. Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS), realized by chemisorption of compounds suitable for Raman spectroscopy onto gold nanoparticles, is a new method for detecting a tumor. As a proof of concept, we studied the use of biocompatible gold nanostars as sensitive SERS contrast agents targeting an ovarian cancer cell line (SKOV3). Due to a high intracellular uptake of gold nanostars after 6 hours of exposure, they could be detected and located with SERS. Using these nanostars for passive targeting after systemic injection in a xenograft mouse model, a detectable signal was measured in the tumor and liver in vivo. These signals were confirmed by ex vivo SERS measurements and darkfield microscopy. In this study, we established SERS nanostars as a highly sensitive contrast agent for tumor detection, which opens the potential for their use as a theranostic agent against cancer.
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Science Technology, Imec; Department of Imaging and Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Biomedical MRI Unit; Faculty of Medicine, Molecular Small Animal Imaging Center (MoSAIC).
authors.forename: Antoine
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: D'Hollander
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Science Technology, Imec; Department of Physics, Faculty of Sciences, Laboratory of Solid State Physics and Magnetism, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Evelien
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Mathieu
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Science Technology, Imec.
authors.forename: Hilde
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Jans
authors.affiliation: Department of Imaging and Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Biomedical MRI Unit; Faculty of Medicine, Molecular Small Animal Imaging Center (MoSAIC).
authors.forename: Greetje
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Vande Velde
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Science Technology, Imec.
authors.forename: Tim
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Stakenborg
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Science Technology, Imec; Department of Physics, Faculty of Sciences, Laboratory of Solid State Physics and Magnetism, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Pol
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Van Dorpe
authors.affiliation: Department of Imaging and Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Biomedical MRI Unit; Faculty of Medicine, Molecular Small Animal Imaging Center (MoSAIC).
authors.forename: Uwe
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Himmelreich
authors.affiliation: Department of Life Science Technology, Imec; Department of Physics, Faculty of Sciences, Laboratory of Solid State Physics and Magnetism, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Liesbet
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Lagae
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001672:Biocompatible Materials / Q000737:chemistry*; D045744:Cell Line, Tumor; D003287:Contrast Media / Q000737:chemistry*; D006046:Gold / Q000737:chemistry; D006801:Humans; D053768:Metal Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry*; D051379:Mice; D008819:Mice, Nude; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis*; D013056:Spectrophotometry, Ultraviolet; D013059:Spectrum Analysis, Raman / Q000379:methods*; D000068936:Theranostic Nanomedicine
chemical_list: D001672:Biocompatible Materials; D003287:Contrast Media; D006046:Gold
keywords: Raman active; SERS; cancer imaging; gold nanostars