Crosslinked Shells for Nano-Assembled Capsules: A New Encapsulation Method for Smaller Gd(3+)-Loaded Capsules with Exceedingly High Relaxivities

Nano-assembled capsules can incorporate large payloads of high relaxivity Gd3+, permitting the development of highly detectable molecular imaging agents for MRI. A new encapsulating shell, based upon cross-linked peptides, is found to afford smaller capsules (127 nm average diameter) with exceptionally high per-Gd3+ relaxivities (70.7 s−1 mmolal−1)