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Cancer imaging

Lighting up tumours

Nature Materials volume 13, pages 122–124 (2014)Cite this article

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Detection of a wide range of tumours remains a challenge in cancer diagnostics. By exploiting changes in the tumour microenvironment, a pH-responsive polymeric nanomaterial enables ultrasensitive tumour-specific imaging in many types of cancer.

Tumours attempt to grow uncontrollably, which comes at great energetic expense, leading to a very high rate of glycolysis under both aerobic and anaerobic conditions. This causes a build-up of lactic acid, which is excreted by tumours leading to a decreased pHe of ∼6.5–6.8, compared with 7.4 for normal tissue and blood3. Although the pH itself is variable from tumour to tumour, it is always acidic in nature. Extrapolating this idea further, sustained tumour growth requires a sustainable supply of nutrients. To achieve this, tumours increase their share of blood flow by releasing a deluge of angiogenic growth factors that initiate the generation of many new blood vessels4. These vessels tend to grow too quickly and, like any job completed too fast, the process is sloppy. The result is the emergence of large gaps or 'fenestrae' on the order of several hundred nanometres5. These gaps allow tumours to filter the blood in a similar manner to the kidneys and the liver; both of which also have fenestrated endothelia. As a consequence, nanoparticles that are normally constrained to the systemic circulation find a new site of accumulation: filtration into the tumour6.

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Figure 1: A schematic representation of pH-sensitive imaging of the tumour microenvironment using ultra-pH-sensitive nanoprobes2.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Daishun Ling, Michael J. Hackett and Taeghwan Hyeon are in the Center for Nanoparticle Research, Institute for Basic Science (IBS), Seoul 151-742, Korea, and School of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-742, Korea,

    Daishun Ling, Michael J. Hackett & Taeghwan Hyeon

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  1. Daishun Ling
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  2. Michael J. Hackett
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  3. Taeghwan Hyeon
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Correspondence to Taeghwan Hyeon.

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Ling, D., Hackett, M. & Hyeon, T. Lighting up tumours. Nature Mater 13, 122–124 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3860

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