Metabolic Tumor Imaging with Rapidly Signal-Enhanced 1-C-13-Pyruvate-d(3)

The metabolism of malignant cells differs significantly from that of healthy cells and thus, it is possible to perform metabolic imaging to reveal not only the exact location of a tumor, but also intratumoral areas of high metabolic activity. Herein, we demonstrate the feasibility of metabolic tumor imaging using signal-enhanced 1-13C-pyruvate-d3, which is rapidly enhanced via para-hydrogen, and thus, the signal is amplified by several orders of magnitudes in less than a minute. Using as a model, human melanoma xenografts injected with signal-enhanced 1-13C-pyruvate-d3, we show that the conversion of pyruvate into lactate can be monitored along with its kinetics, which could pave the way for rapidly detecting and monitoring changes in tumor metabolism