Molecular Beacons for Clinical Cancer Imaging

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There is a growing need in medical imaging to detect and characterize different disease processes. Molecular optical imaging is a new imaging modality that generates molecular images using penetrating light rays and offers the possibility to employ fluorescently-tagged reported beacons to obtain specific molecular information about a particular disease state. VisEN Medical is pioneering the development of a novel optical imaging prove technology for clinical cancer imaging. This technology is based on near-infrared optical probes disease. Inside a human, the probes become activated or "imageable" only when they come in contact with the specific enzymes that they are designed to target, resulting in high specificity and signal amplification. We expect this molecular imaging technology to have a major impact on the screening, diagnosis, characterization characterize and optimize an optical molecular probe for future pre-clinical testing. We have chosen to target the enzyme cathepsin B using this technology, as it is known to be associated with many key steps in cancer growth and metastasis. PROPOSED COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS: VisEn Medical plans to develop a cancer imaging probe for human testing within two years. Understanding diseases such as cancer at its molecular level will help to (1) detect early disease-even before morphological changes are present, (2) better characterize different disease states, and (3) improve, guide and monitor disease treatment.