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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · World J Nucl Med 2021; 20(03): 266-272
DOI: 10.4103/wjnm.WJNM_103_20
Original Article

Evaluation of 68Ga-DOTA-Ubiquicidin (29–41) for imaging Staphylococcus aureus (Staph A) infection and turpentine-induced inflammation in a preclinical setting

Dilip Kumar Boddeti
1   Department of Nuclear Medicine and PET, Westmead Hospital, Sydney NSW, Australia
2   Department of Nuclear Medicine, The Children's Hospital at Westmead, Westmead, Sydney NSW, Australia
3   Westmead Clinical School, University of Sydney, Sydney NSW, Australia
,
Vijay Kumar
1   Department of Nuclear Medicine and PET, Westmead Hospital, Sydney NSW, Australia
2   Department of Nuclear Medicine, The Children's Hospital at Westmead, Westmead, Sydney NSW, Australia
4   Discipline of Child and Adolescent Health, Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney, Sydney NSW, Australia
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Abstract

Synthetic antimicrobial peptide fragment, 99mTc-Ubiquicidin 29–41, is shown to be sensitive and also specific for imaging bacterial infections. We undertook this study to explore the advantage of using a positron emission agent, 68Ga-DOTA-Ubiquicidin 29–41 (68Ga-DOTA-UBI), for detecting Staph-A infection in an animal model, and also evaluated its ability to distinguish a turpentine-induced sterile inflammation in an animal model. Pure Ga-68 was freshly eluted from a 68Ge/68Ga generator (IGG-100). DOTA-UBI (50 μg) was ra diolabeled with pure Ga-68 (500MBq) by incubating the reaction mixture at pH 4.5 for 10 min, 95°C. Rats were infected with Staph-A at the hind leg joint of rats to form bacterial abscess. Sterile inflammation was induced in the right thigh muscle by injecting 200 μl of 100% turpentine oil. Rats were injected intravenously with 10–15 MBq of tracer, and images were acquired at different time intervals with Siemens (Biograph mCT) positron emission tomography computed tomography scanner. The early images at 6 min postinjection clearly indicated mild uptake of the agent corresponding to the infection site, which increased dramatically at 20, 30, and 60 min postinjection. The target to background ratio (T/B) increased significantly over the same time period of study (1.6, 4.2, and 6.1, respectively). There was a mild uptake of 68Ga-DOTA-UBI at the site corresponding to sterile inflammation at 6 min postinjection, which was rapidly washed off as seen at 25 and 45 min images. The images indicated fast clearance of the agent from liver and soft tissues within 6 min. Control rats showed similar biodistribution of activity. The mild uptake of 68Ga-DOTA-UBI at the corresponding Staph-A infection lesion and very fast kinetics of clearance from the blood pool and soft tissues suggested a very high clinical potential for this agent. The absence of uptake of the agent at sterile inflammation site suggests that the agent may be useful in distinguishing infection from inflammation.

Keywords

68Ga-DOTA-Ubiquicidine (29–41) - 68Ga-positron emission tomography - infection imaging - inflammation imaging - Staphylococcus aureus

Financial support and sponsorship

Nil.




Publication History

Received: 21 July 2020

Accepted: 30 September 2020

Article published online:
24 March 2022

© 2021. Sociedade Brasileira de Neurocirurgia. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commecial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

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