Magnetic Insight Awarded NIH SBIR grant to Advance In Vivo Biosensing Through Color Magnetic Particle Imaging

ALAMEDA, Calif., Oct. 2, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Magnetic Insight, Inc., the leader in magnetic particle imaging (MPI) solutions, is pleased to announce it was awarded a Fast-Track Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The project, "Color MPI as a Novel Method for in vivo Assessment of Magnetic Nanoparticle Dynamics and Binding," proposes a new imaging method called "Color MPI (c-MPI)," which can add new image contrast to MPI images. Principal Investigators Patrick Goodwill, Chief Technology Officer, Magnetic Insight, and Steven Conolly, Professor of Bioengineering and Electrical Engineering at the University of California Berkeley, spearhead this research alongside a team of engineers, application scientists, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows.

Current biomedical imaging methods are indispensable for diagnosing high-mortality diseases like Cancer, Cardiovascular Disease and Stroke. For decades, researchers have attempted to improve the contrast of these imaging methods by injecting two-component molecular imaging tracers: an invisible, physiologically specific targeting agent (peptide, antibody, etc) attached to a visible reporter. A stubborn challenge that reduces the sensitivity and specificity of these methods is that unbound reporters greatly outnumber bound reporters, often by 100-fold, effectively obscuring the pathophysiology. It would be a major advance in medical molecular imaging if bound and unbound reporters could be separated in the image, as contrast would improve dramatically. However, current imaging modalities cannot distinguish bound from unbound tracers.

In this grant, we develop a new imaging method, called Color MPI, which is capable of distinguishing between bound and unbound tracers that bind specifically to diseased tissue. The work builds on top of MPI, which is a revolutionary, noninvasive, and exquisitely sensitive imaging method that shows outstanding promise for biomedical imaging. The unique physics of MPI allows enables detection of bound and from unbound nanoparticles.

"With this grant, we aim to develop and then incorporate c-MPI into our commercial pre-clinical imager to enable our customers to explore the limits of the technique," said Goodwill. "I'm looking forward to advancing and expanding the capabilities of MPI."

Research reported in this press release was supported by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering of the National Institutes of Health under award number R44EB029877. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

About Magnetic Insight –
Magnetic Insight is an early stage diagnostic imaging company accelerating preclinical research with direct translation into the clinic. Magnetic Particle Imaging (MPI) is an ultrasensitive, safe, and quantitative technology built on high-contrast detection of iron-oxide nanoparticles. MPI provides faster, safer, and more accurate detection of cells, blood perfusion, and targeted biological events. Meet us: www.magneticinsight.com

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SOURCE Magnetic Insight, Inc.