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Molecular Ultrasound Imaging of Tissue Inflammation Using an Animal Model of Acute Kidney Injury

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Abstract

Purpose

The objective of this study was to evaluate the use of molecular ultrasound (US) imaging for monitoring the early inflammatory effects following acute kidney injury.

Procedures

A population of rats underwent 30 min of renal ischemia (acute kidney injury, N = 6) or sham injury (N = 4) using established surgical methods. Animals were divided and molecular US imaging was performed during the bolus injection of a targeted microbubble (MB) contrast agent to either P-selectin or vascular cell adhesion molecule 1 (VCAM-1). Imaging was performed before surgery and 4 and 24 h thereafter. After manual segmentation of renal tissue space, the molecular US signal was calculated as the difference between time-intensity curve data before MB injection and after reaching steady-state US image enhancement. All animals were terminated after the 24 h imaging time point and kidneys excised for immunohistochemical (IHC) analysis.

Results

Renal inflammation was analyzed using molecular US imaging. While results using the P-selectin and VCAM-1 targeted MBs were comparable, it appears that the former was more sensitive to biomarker expression. All molecular US imaging measures had a positive correlation with IHC findings.

Conclusions

Acute kidney injury is a serious disease in need of improved noninvasive methods to help diagnose the extent of injury and monitor the tissue throughout disease progression. Molecular US imaging appears well suited to address this challenge and more research is warranted.

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Acknowledgments

This research project was supported by NIH grant numbers P30DK079337 and K25EB017222. The authors would like to thank the UAB-UCSD O’Brien Core Center for Acute Injury Research for performing all rat surgeries and the UAB Center for Metabolic Bone Disease for IHC protocol development and processing of renal tissue samples.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors confirm that this article content has no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Radiology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA

    Kenneth Hoyt

  2. Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA

    Kenneth Hoyt & Sithira Ratnayaka

  3. Department of Surgery, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA

    Jason M. Warram

  4. Department of Pathology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA

    Dezhi Wang

  5. Department of Medicine, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA

    Amie Traylor & Anupam Agarwal

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  1. Kenneth Hoyt
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  2. Jason M. Warram
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  4. Sithira Ratnayaka
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  6. Anupam Agarwal
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Correspondence to Kenneth Hoyt.

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Hoyt, K., Warram, J.M., Wang, D. et al. Molecular Ultrasound Imaging of Tissue Inflammation Using an Animal Model of Acute Kidney Injury. Mol Imaging Biol 17, 786–792 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11307-015-0860-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11307-015-0860-6

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