Abstract
Purpose: Prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) is highly up-regulated in prostate tumor cells, providing an ideal target for imaging applications of prostate cancer. CTT-1297 (IC50 = 27 nM) is an irreversible phosphoramidate inhibitor of PSMA that has been conjugated to the CB-TE1K1P chelator for incorporation of Cu-64. The resulting positron emission tomography (PET) agent, [64Cu]ABN-1, was evaluated for selective uptake both in vitro and in vivo in PSMA-positive cells of varying expression levels. The focus of this study was to assess the ability of [64Cu]ABN-1 to detect and distinguish varying levels of PSMA in a panel of prostate tumor-bearing mouse models. Procedures: CTT-1297 was conjugated to the CB-TE1K1P chelator using click chemistry and radiolabeled with Cu-64. Internalization and binding affinity of [64Cu]ABN-1 was evaluated in the following cell lines having varying levels of PSMA expression: LNCaP late-passage > LNCaP early passage ≈ C4-2B > CWR22rv1 and PSMA-negative PC-3 cells. PET/X-ray computed tomography imaging was performed in NCr nude mice with subcutaneous tumors of the variant PSMA-expressing cell lines. Results: [64Cu]ABN-1 demonstrated excellent uptake in PSMA-positive cells in vitro, with ∼80 % internalization at 4 h for each PSMA-positive cell line with uptake (fmol/mg) correlating to PSMA expression levels. The imaging data indicated significant tumor uptake in all models. The biodistribution for late-passage LNCaP (highest PSMA expression) demonstrated the highest specific uptake of [64Cu]ABN-1 with tumor-to-muscle and tumor-to-blood ratios of 30 ± 11 and 21 ± 7, respectively, at 24 h post-injection. [64Cu]ABN-1 cleared through all tissues except for PSMA-positive kidneys. Conclusion: [64Cu]ABN-1 demonstrated selective uptake in PSMA-positive cells and tumors, which correlated to the level of PSMA expression. The data reported herein suggest that [64Cu]ABN-1 will selectively target and image variant PSMA expression and in the future will serve as a non-invasive method to follow the progression of prostate cancer in men.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 402-410 |
Number of pages | 9 |
Journal | Molecular Imaging and Biology |
Volume | 18 |
Issue number | 3 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jun 2016 |
Keywords
- Copper-64
- Irreversible inhibitor
- PET
- PSMA
- Phosphoramidate
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Oncology
- Radiology Nuclear Medicine and imaging
- Cancer Research