Macromolecular Crowding May Significantly Affect the Performance of an MRI Contrast Agent: A ¹H NMR Spectroscopy, Microimaging, and Fast-Field-Cycling NMR Relaxometry Study.

ABSTRACT: Contrast enhancement agents are often employed in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for clinical diagnosis and biomedical research. However, the current theory on MRI contrast generation does not consider the ubiquitous presence of macromolecular crowders in biological systems, which poses the risk of inaccurate data interpretation and misdiagnosis. To address this issue, herein the macromolecular crowding effects on MRI contrast agent are investigated with the ¹H relaxation rate of water in aqueous solutions of Dotarem with different concentrations of macromolecules. Two representative macromolecular crowder systems are used: polyethylene glycol (with no specific secondary structure) and bovine serum albumin (with compact secondary and tertiary structures). The water ¹

SUBMITTER: Cheng RH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5891664 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature