During the last year, BET Solutions has managed to radiolabel the nanoparticles in order to follow their distribution in the body after administration. So far, the intravenous administration route was used as a reference since it represents the most commonly-used path to deliver pharmaceuticals into the body.
The in vivo fate of the NPs was assessed through planar Single Photon Emission Tomography (SPECT) imaging, in combination with x-ray imaging. While the SPECT imaging provides a semi-quantitative picture of the accumulation of the nanoparticles in the organs throughout time, the x-ray imaging instead provides an anatomical image at very high resolution, that can act as an anatomical map. The combination of the two methods provides a detailed and clear biodistribution of the tracked nanoparticles up to 24 hours. In the future, this procedure will be also applied to test the nanoparticles biodistribution after inhalation, the administration route preferred by CUPIDO.
