Project Leader:
Paul Schaffer

Lead Institution:
TRIUMF

Research Funding Program:
Strategic Opportunities Fund - Round 4

Molecular imaging (MI) is a powerful tool that probes the function of living systems, enabling non-invasive determination of physiological changes during the onset and progression of disease. Novel MI probes are of paramount importance for elucidating the molecular origin of illness. Antisense PET has seen modest success due to the intrinsically poor pharmaceutical behaviour of oligonucleotides. The project team is working towards the development of a novel class of antisense oligonucleotide-based MI agents that will dramatically alter disease diagnosis, staging and treatment by enabling clinicians to visualize and quantify genetic activity associated with a specific condition. Thus, antisensebased drugs and imaging agents represent broadly enabling platforms for addressing virtually any disease state that involves a coding RNA message (mRNA).

This project aims to demonstrate the production and pre-clinical translation of antisense MI probes by merging state-of-the-art microfluidics with radiochemistry to provide radiolabeled peptide-PNA chimeras for in vivo imaging of mRNA expression. MI requires interdisciplinary expertise that spans physics, chemistry, engineering and medicine. To be successful, this project brings together four top British Columbia institutions: TRIUMF, Simon Fraser University (SFU), the University of British Columbia (UBC) and the BC Cancer Agency (BCCA) with deep expertise in radiopharmaceuticals (TRIUMF, BCCA), microfluidics (SFU), peptide - and oligonucleotide chemistry (TRIUMF, UBC) and imaging (BCCA) to accomplish the goals described within.

The translational outcomes of this work will enable the rapid and reliable production of a portfolio of highly specific MI agents. In addition, this proposal will interface novel, proprietary techniques in automation, microfluidics, and radiosynthesis to create new platforms for the rapid production, evaluation and translation of new entities for imaging and improved disease management.