Platform for myocardial infarct MRI and delivery of therapeutics

仅在美国，每年就有100多万人患有心肌梗塞。心肌梗死会导致永久性左心室(LV)疤痕形成，导致泵效率降低，通常还会导致心力衰竭。为了减少或消除疤痕，人们对修复生物材料越来越感兴趣，例如细胞和蛋白质，这些材料在心肌梗死后早期被引入到左室受影响的区域。我们相信，这种做法最终将成为护理标准的一部分。这种材料最有希望的输送途径是直接左心室注射(DLVI)。到目前为止，由于缺乏准确的空间靶向受影响组织的方法，DLVI的应用一直受到阻碍。这极大地阻碍了有希望的材料的临床翻译。这个项目的目标是设计尖端的成像工具，使用核磁共振成像来可视化梗死区。

Myocardial infarction (MI) afflicts more than one million persons per year in the United States alone. MI results in permanent left ventricle (LV) scarring that causes diminished pump efficiency and, commonly, heart failure. Towards reduction or elimination of scarring, there is increasing interest in reparative biological materials, such as cells and proteins, that are introduced into the affected region of the LV early after MI. We believe that such an approach will eventually become part of a standard of care. The most promising route for the delivery of such materials is direct LV injection (DLVI). Thus far, the utility of DLVI has been hampered by the lack methods for accurate spatial targeting of affected tissue. This has greatly impeded clinical translation of promising materials. The goal of this project is to devise cutting edge imaging tools to visualize infarcted regions using MRI.