Radical Radiochemistry for Site- and Copy-Controlled 18F-Labeling of Proteins

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One of the most common methods for diagnosing and following the development and/or treatment of disease is to use positron emission tomography (PET). This relies upon the use of suitable positron emitting radionuclides: unstable elements that collapse emitting positron radiation that can bee seen inside even whole bodies. Foremost amongst these is the use of 18F and, indeed, most hospitals in the UK (and around the world) are equipped with suitable scanners to allow the detection of 18 F as a label inside patience. To date, the use of 18F, however has been largely restricted to its attachment to small molecule drugs - most licensed 18F-'radiotracers' are small molecules. This is despite the development of some useful experimental methods for attaching 18F onto more complex molecules of interest, including new and next-generation protein drugs (biologics). Most of these current methods, however, introduce bulky additional groups ('scars' - often in many copies) that lead to perturbation of a biomolecule's function and the creation of mixtures. This creates a conundrum: in that whilst we can label these molecules using these older methods, we cannot be sure that they behave in the same way after labelling. This, in turn, creates the possibility of artefacts in the data that are generated that precludes a deeper understanding of how this important class of molecules behaves and stops the application of PET more generally to understand complex biology and physiology. In this proposal we will develop new methods that allow the insertion of 18F into proteins in a 'scar-free' manner to create more pure 18F-proteins. This will enable their use in a form that is essentially near identical to their natural form. This greater purity and precision is likely to provide an important tool that will allow biological and medical sciences to advance and to use this powerful form of imaging much more widely.