Imaging pulmonary gene expression

Richard JC, Zhou Z, Ponde DE, Dence CS, Factor P, Reynolds PN, Luker GD, Sharma V, Ferkol T, Piwnica-Worms D, Schuster DP. Imaging pulmonary gene expression with positron emission tomography. Am J Respir Grit Care Med 2003 167 1257-1263. 

Pulmonary and Cardiac Imaging, edited by C. Chiles and C. E. Putman Gene Therapy for Diseases of the Lung, edited by K. L Brigham Oxygen, Gene Expression, and Cellular Function, edited by L Biadasz... 

Recently, we undertook a comprehensive evaluation of these various forms of image quantitation in gene expression imaging studies of the lungs and compared the results with in vitro assays of the expression of TK enzyme activity (71). In this analysis, we found that the pulmonary uptake of [ F]-FHBG increased as TK enzyme activity increased only at low levels of HSVl-f expression and then plateaued as TK activity continued to increase [Fig. 8.10(A)]. Compartmental modeling failed to improve the correlation with in vitro assays of transgene expression. 

To date, the optimal PRG-PRP system is still a matter of debate, and may differ depending on the tissue or process under study. Even so, the use of PET imaging to monitor exogenous gene transfer in pulmonary tissue by measuring the expression of a suitable enzyme is already proving to be a fruitful experimental strategy (41-43). 

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