In vivo quantitative susceptibility mapping detection of ß-amyloid targeted by curcumin-conjugated magnetic nanoparticles

Abstract

At present, there is a lack of reliable in vivo diagnostic methods to visualize and quantify the Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathologies. β-amyloid (Aβ) plaques are the hallmarks of AD brains. Recently, we have designed a novel curcumin-conjugated magnetic nanoparticles (Cur-MNPs) that target Aβ pathologies. Quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) offers the possibility of quantifying Cur-MNPs in vivo as a quantitative surrogate marker for Aβ pathologies. In this study, we optimized the QSM acquisition and processing procedure for mouse brains in vivo. Furthermore, we investigated the ability of QSM in detecting Cur-MNPs targeted Aβ pathologies in vivo in transgenic AD mouse models.