Lionel Mignion1,
Prasanta Dutta2, Gary V. Martinez2, Parastou Foroutan3,
Robert J. Gillies3, Benedicte Jordan1
1Louvain
Drug Research Institute, Biomedical Magnetic Resonance Research Group,
Universite Catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium; 2Department of
Imaging Research, H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute, Tampa,
FL, United States; 3Department of Imaging Research, H. Lee Moffitt
Cancer Center, Tampa, FL, United States
This study assesses the response to a multikinase inhibitor, Sorafenib, using a combined hyperpolarized 13C-fumarate and 13C-pyruvate in comparison with diffusion weighted-MRI (DW-MRI). In MDA-MB-231 mammary xenografts, hyperpolarized MRS using 13C-fumarate is an early in vivo marker of response to Sorafenib and is positively correlated with DW-MRI, with a higher sensitivity for 13C-fumarate with respect to DW-MRI. Results are in accordance with ex vivo H&E analysis. The lactate to pyruvate ratio does not seem to be an in vivo marker of tumor response to the multikinase inhibitor in this tumor model.