Commercialization of the Shutter-Speed Model for Dynamic MRI in Cancer Diagnosis

描述(申请人提供)：尽管在癌症检测和治疗方面取得了显著进步，但该病仍然是美国死亡的主要原因，占2011年所有死亡人数的23%。到目前为止，乳腺癌和前列腺癌分别是美国女性和男性诊断出的最常见的癌症，预计今年将有超过45万例新病例和超过6.8万人死亡。由于每种疾病的严重过度治疗都是一个如此重要的问题，迫切需要改进微创检测和治疗监测的方法。动态增强(DCE)-MRI在这方面提供了很大的希望。这是一种在静脉注射顺磁造影剂(CR)之前、期间和之后获取T1加权MR图像的时间序列的技术。近年来，使用药代动力学模型量化DCE-MRI时间序列的好处引起了人们的极大兴趣，由此产生的参数图在癌症诊断和治疗评估中变得越来越重要。最近的研究表明，定量DCE-MRI有可能提高癌症检测的准确性，并提供更早和更准确的癌症治疗反应评估。该SBIR快速通道项目的总体目标是开发和验证基于“快门-速度模型”(SSM)的商业诊断软件应用程序，用于定量DCE-MRI。SSM是一种新的算法，它恰当地解释了组织间水交换的有限动力学。这一点很重要，因为DCE-MRI的一个独特方面是，通过它们对1H2O MR信号的影响，间接检测CRS；CR是示踪分子，而水是信号分子。SSM方法自然接受了这一特征，并已被证明比标准示踪剂DCE药代动力学模型提供了更可靠的良恶性组织区分。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Despite remarkable advances in cancer detection and treatment, the disease continues to be a leading cause of mortality in the US accounting for 23% of all deaths in 2011. Cancer of the breast and prostate are by far the most common forms diagnosed in US women and men, respectively, and together are expected to represent more than 450,000 (246,000 prostate, 229,000 breast cancers) new cases and more than 68,000 deaths this year. Since the serious overtreatment of each disease is such a significant issue, improved methods for minimally invasive detection and therapy monitoring are badly needed. Dynamic contrast- enhanced (DCE)-MRI offers substantial promise in this regard. It is a technique acquiring a time-series of T1- weighted MR images before, during, and after intravenous injection of a paramagnetic contrast reagent (CR). The benefits of quantifying the DCE-MRI time-series using a pharmacokinetic model have gained significant interest in recent years and the resulting parametric maps are increasingly important in cancer diagnostics and treatment evaluation. Recent studies demonstrate that quantitative DCE-MRI has the potential to improve accuracy in cancer detection and provide earlier and more accurate evaluation of cancer response to therapy. The overall goal of this SBIR Fast-Track project is to develop and validate a commercial diagnostic software application based on the "Shutter-Speed Model" (SSM) for quantitative DCE-MRI. The SSM is a novel algorithm that properly accounts for the finite kinetics of water exchange between tissue compartments. This is important because a unique aspect of DCE-MRI is that the CRs are detected indirectly, via their effect on the 1H2O MR signal; CR is the tracer molecule but water is the signal molecule. The SSM approach naturally embraces this feature and has been shown to deliver more reliable discrimination between benign and malignant tissue than the standard tracer DCE pharmacokinetic model.