Exploring Metabolism In Vivo Using Endogenous 11C Metabolic Tracers

Cancer and other diseases are increasingly understood in terms of their metabolic disturbances. This thinking has revolutionized the field of ex vivo metabolomics and motivated new approaches to detect metabolites in living systems, including proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H-MRS), hyperpolarized 13C MRS, and PET. For PET, imaging abnormal metabolism in vivo is hardly new. Positron-labeled small-molecule metabolites have been used for decades in humans, including 18F-FDG, which is used frequently to detect upregulated glycolysis in tumors.
Source: Seminars in Nuclear Medicine - Category: Nuclear Medicine Authors: Source Type: research