Whole cancer visualization using gadobutrol-glucose solution and 7.0 t magnetic resonance imaging

Cancer tissue absorbs 3-8 times more glucose than normal tissue. Therefore, we developed a gadobutrol-glucose solution for 7.0T magnetic resonance imaging to visualize whole cancerous regions at high contrast. The contrast medium consists of gadobutrol and glucose solutions, and these solutions are mixed before the vein infusion. We used readily available solutions, and the concentrations of the gadobutrol and glucose solutions were 60% and 5.0%, respectively. To visualize the cancerous region, we used two rabbits with VX7 thigh cancer. First, vein injection was carried out using a gadobutrol-saline solution containing 0.3 ml gadobutrol, and T1-weighted imaging (T1WI) was performed. Twenty-four hours after the first experiment, we performed T1WI of the VX7-cancer region using 50.3 mL gadobutrol-glucose solution including 0.3 ml gadobutrol. Compared with T1WI using the gadobutrol-saline solution, the signal intensity of the cancerous region substantially increased using the gadobutrol-glucose solution. We confirmed significant signal-intensity increases in the whole VX7-cancer region of a rabbit thigh utilizing vein infusion of gadobutrol-glucose solution since the gadobutrol molecules were absorbed throughout the cancerous region along with glucose molecules. (author)