Reductive microenvironment responsive gadolinium-based polymers as potential safe MRI contrast agents

Abstract

Accumulation of nano-scale contrast agents in body tissues potentially induces adverse effects associated with free Gd(III) ion release from the nano-scale system, such as nephrogenic systemic fibrosis and gadolinium deposition in the brain tissue. A novel formulation strategy was proposed herein for Gd-based macromolecular MRI contrast agents (Gd-mCAs), which may significantly reduce Gd(III) retention but maintain sufficient imaging contrast. Biodegradable poly[N-(1,3-dihydroxypropyl)methacrylamide] copolymers (pDHPMA) were synthesized from N-(1,3-dihydroxypropyl)methacrylamide (DHPMA) as a monomer and enzyme-responsive short peptide (GFLG) as a chain transfer agent. Small molecular Gd-chelate (Gd-DOTA) was conjugated onto the copolymer backbone through a sulfide bond or a GSH-sensitive cleavable disulfide bond to produce two novel Gd-mCAs (pDHPMA-Cy5.5-DOTA-Gd or pDHPMA-Cy5.5-SS-DOTA-Gd) for tumor diagnosis. Their relaxivities were 10.49 and 10.24 mM⁻¹ s⁻¹ respectively, which were significantly higher than that of DTPA-Gd (3.97 mM⁻¹ s⁻¹). Compared with pDHPMA-Cy5.5-DOTA-Gd, pDHPMA-Cy5.5-SS-DOTA-Gd had a shorter Gd(III) retention time but maintained a sufficient contrast efficacy. We have demonstrated that the conjugation of small molecular Gd-chelate to biodegradable macromolecular carriers through a ROX-sensitive biocleavable disulfide bond may be an efficient strategy for formulating safe biodegradable Gd-based pDHPMA copolymers as MRI contrast agents.