A novel apoptosis probe, cyclic ApoPep-1, for in vivo imaging with multimodal applications in chronic inflammatory arthritis

In this study we investigated whether cyclic apoptosis-targeting peptide-1 (CApoPep-1) can be used as an apoptosis imaging probe in inflammatory arthritis. We tested the utility ofCApoPep-1 for detecting apoptotic immune cells in vitro and ex vivo using flow cytometry and immunofluorescence. The feasibility of visualizing and quantifying apoptosis using this probe was evaluated in a murine collagen-induced arthritis (CIA) model, especially after treatment.CApoPep-1 peptide may successfully replace Annexin V for in vitro and terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end labeling (TUNEL) assay for ex vivo in the measurement of apoptotic cells, thus function as a sensitive probe enough to be used clinically. In vivo imaging in CIA mice revealed thatCApoPep-1 had 42.9 times higher fluorescence intensity than Annexin V for apoptosis quantification. Furthermore, it may be used as an imaging probe for early detection of apoptotic response in situ after treatment. TheCApoPep-1 signal was mostly co-localized with the TUNEL signal (69.6% of TUNEL+ cells) in defined cell populations in joint tissues of CIA mice. These results demonstrate thatCApoPep-1 is sufficiently sensitive to be used as an apoptosis imaging probe for multipurpose applications which could detect the same target across in vitro, in vivo, to ex vivo in inflammatory arthritis.
Source: Apoptosis - Category: Molecular Biology Source Type: research