FLUORESCENCE SPECTROPHOTOMETER IN NIR RANGE FOR BIOLOGICAL AND MEDICAL APPLICATIO

描述（由申请人提供）：充分实现分子医学最新进展的好处，需要开发针对特定细胞、受体、异常基因和蛋白质的分子成像探针，用于治疗和诊断干预。与其他成像方式一样，使用近红外（NIR）光（700-1700纳米）的光学成像有望成为医疗保健领域的重要工具。光谱的近红外区域，也被称为光学窗口，为光子深入生物组织提供了重要的优势。为了研究近红外光子与生物组织的关系，以及开发具有近红外光学活性的分子荧光探针，我们要求将已有10年历史的荧光仪升级为专门用于近红外的最先进的荧光分光光度计。所要求的系统将配备近红外光源和超灵敏探测器，荧光寿命和偏振模块，将高度灵活，并将满足13名NIH资助的研究人员的迫切需求，这些研究人员来自圣路易斯地区的三所主要大学：圣路易斯华盛顿大学，圣路易斯密苏里大学。圣路易斯和圣路易斯大学。该仪器将支持的研究包括不同领域，从光学不同造影剂的设计（有机染料、聚合物纳米颗粒、金纳米笼和荧光蛋白），成像方式的发展（荧光稳态和寿命成像、光声学和光学断层扫描），到探针和方法在肿瘤诊断、癌症治疗、细菌检测和大脑功能理解中的应用。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Full realization of the benefits of recent advances in molecular medicine requires the development of molecular imaging probes that target specific cells, receptors, aberrant genes, and proteins for therapeutic and diagnostic interventions. As with other imaging modalities, optical imaging using near-infrared (NIR) light (700-1700 nm) promises to become an important tool in healthcare. The NIR region of the spectrum, also known as the optical windows, offers important advantages for photon penetration deep into biological tissue. For fundamental studies of NIR photons with biological tissue and the development of molecular fluorescent probes optically active in NIR, we request to upgrade our 10 year old fluorometer to a state-of-the-art fluorescence spectrophotometer specifically dedicated to NIR. The requested system will be equipped with NIR light sources and ultrasensitive detectors, fluorescence lifetime, and polarization modules, will be highly flexible and will satisfy the urgent need of 13 NIH funded researchers from three major universities in the Saint Louis area: Washington University in St. Louis, University of Missouri -St. Louis, and Saint Louis University. The research that will be supported by this instrument includes diverse fields from the design of optically diverse contrast agents (organic dyes, polymer nanoparticles, gold nanocages, and fluorescent proteins), development of imaging modalities (fluorescence steady-state and lifetime imaging, photoacoustics, and optical tomography), to application of the probes and methods to tumor diagnostics, cancer treatment, bacteria detection, and understanding of brain function.