title: Hyaluronic Acid-Chitosan Nanoparticles to Deliver Gd-DTPA for MR Cancer Imaging.
abstract: Molecular imaging is essential to increase the sensitivity and selectivity of cancer diagnosis especially at the early stage of tumors. Recently, polyionic nanocomplexes (PICs), which are composed of polyanions and opposite polycations, have been demonstrated to be a promising strategy for biomedical applications. In this work, chitosan-hyaluronic acid nanoparticles (GCHN) were developed to deliver Gd-DTPA as MRI contrast agents for tumor diagnosis. The Gd-labeled conjugates (CS-DTPA-Gd) were successfully synthesized by carbodiimide reaction, and then GCHN were prepared by ionic gelation using the obtained CS-DTPA-Gd and hyaluronic acid. The morphology of GCHN was spherical or ellipsoidal, which is observed by transmission electronic microscopy (TEM). The mean particle size and zeta potential of GCHN were 213.8 ± 2.6 nm and 19.92 ± 1.69 mV, respectively. The significant enhancement of signal intensity induced by GCHN was observed bothin vitroandin vivo. Also, compared with Magnevist, GCHN was witnessed for a prolonged imaging time in the B16 tumor-bearing mice model. Furthermore, GCHN were verified as below toxic bothin vitroandin vivo. These results indicated that GCHN could potentially be an alternative to current MRI contrast agents for tumor diagnosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, School of Pharmaceutical Science, Shandong University, Ji'nan 250012, China. zl3553@163.com.
authors.forename: Li
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, School of Pharmaceutical Science, Shandong University, Ji'nan 250012, China. liutx901115@163.com.
authors.forename: Tingxian
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, School of Pharmaceutical Science, Shandong University, Ji'nan 250012, China. xiaoyn910424@163.com.
authors.forename: Yanan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology Medicine, Affiliated Qilu Hospital, Shandong University, Ji'nan 250012, China. ydx0330@sina.com.
authors.forename: Dexin
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, School of Pharmaceutical Science, Shandong University, Ji'nan 250012, China. zhangnancy9@sdu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Na
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Zhang
keywords: Gd-DTPA; chitosan nanoparticles; hyaluronic acid; magnetic resonance imaging; tumor imaging