In this work, we report a novel method for obtaining an exact molecular targeted NMR, MRI and MRS. This method uses the nuclear spin singlet state (SSS)1,2 to obtain the molecular selectivity. Figure 1a shows the scheme of the pulse sequences. By using the pulse sequence in Figure 1a, we are able to obtain molecular targeted NMR spectroscopy. Figure 1b shows the 1H spectra of L-Alanine-glycine-glycine (AGG)/insulin mixture, acquired using the single pulse excitation and YAWX-NMR. The singlet state of the two-spin system (Hc and Hc') was prepared in the experiment. The preparation of the spin singlet state of Hc and Hc' of AGG requires a strict match between the parameters in the pulse sequence and the properties of the spin system3. Clearly, in Figure 1b only the signals from Hc and Hc' can be observed, indicating the excellent molecular selectivity of the method. Figure 1c demonstrates the example of molecular targeted MRI, acquired using YAWX-MRI. A photo of the image phantom, the 1H spin echo MRI image and three molecular targeted MRI images (from left to right) are shown in Figure 1c. In the 1H spin-echo MRI image, the big grey disk is from the water inside the 5 mm glass tube, whereas the black, gray and white disks are from the capillaries containing HDO water, the AGG, N-acetylaspartate (NAA) and dopamine (DA) aqueous solutions, respectively. In each of the molecular targeted 1H MRI images of AGG, NAA and DA, only the signal/image of the corresponding targeted molecule can be observed, indicating the excellent molecular selectivity of the method.

Molecular targeted magnetic resonance spectroscopy and imaging

ACS Fall 2020 Virtual Meeting

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.