{"doi":"10.1021/acsabm.2c00892","title":"Engineered Nonviral Protein Cages Modified for MR Imaging","abstract":"High Resolution Image Download MS PowerPoint Slide Diagnostic medical imaging utilizes magnetic resonance (MR) to provide anatomical, functional, and molecular information in a single scan. Nanoparticles are often labeled with Gd(III) complexes to amplify the MR signal of contrast agents (CAs) with large payloads and high proton relaxation efficiencies (relaxivity, r 1 ). This study examined the MR performance of two structurally unique cages, AaLS-13 and OP, labeled with Gd(III). The cages have characteristics relevant for the development of theranostic platforms, including (i) well-defined structure, symmetry, and size; (ii) the amenability to extensive engineering; (iii) the adjustable loading of therapeutically relevant cargo molecules; (iv) high physical stability; and (v) facile manufacturing by microbial fermentation. The resulting conjugates showed significantly enhanced proton relaxivity ( r 1 = 11–18 mM –1 s –1 at 1.4 T) compared to the Gd(III) complex alone ( r 1 = 4 mM –1 s –1 ). Serum phantom images revealed 107% and 57% contrast enhancements for Gd(III)-labeled AaLS-13 and OP cages, respectively. Moreover, proton nuclear magnetic relaxation dispersion ( 1 H NMRD) profiles showed maximum relaxivity values of 50 mM –1 s –1 . Best-fit analyses of the 1 H NMRD profiles attributed the high relaxivity of the Gd(III)-labeled cages to the slow molecular tumbling of the conjugates and restricted local motion of the conjugated Gd(III) complex.","journal":"ACS Applied Bio Materials","year":2023,"id":348989,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":10,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9475,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2023-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":1091753,"name":"Mikail D. Levasseur","orcid":"0000-0003-4228-0875","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1091754,"name":"Thomas G. W. Edwardson","orcid":"0000-0001-8661-8036","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":536681,"name":"Michael A. Caldwell","orcid":"0000-0002-8636-0706","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1091755,"name":"Daniela Hofmann","orcid":"0000-0001-7073-0744","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1091756,"name":"Giulia Licciardi","orcid":"0000-0002-9169-9392","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1035564,"name":"Giacomo Parigi","orcid":"0000-0002-1989-4644","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":72950,"name":"Claudio Luchinat","orcid":"0000-0003-2271-8921","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":231427,"name":"Donald Hilvert","orcid":"0000-0002-3941-621X","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":381519,"name":"Thomas J. Meade","orcid":"0000-0001-6202-1155","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1091752,"name":"Megan A. Kaster","orcid":"0000-0001-5550-4028","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":83,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:12:10.335697Z","pmid":"36626688","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}