Analysis of tumour oxygenation in model animals on a phosphorescence lifetime based macro-imager

Monitoring of tissue O(2) is essential for cancer development and treatment, as hypoxic tumour regions develop resistance to radio- and chemotherapy. We describe a minimally invasive technique for the monitoring of tissue oxygenation in developing grafted tumours, which uses the new phosphorescence lifetime based Tpx3Cam imager. CT26 cells stained with a near-infrared emitting nanoparticulate O(2) probe NanO2-IR were injected into mice to produce grafted tumours with characteristic phosphorescence. The tumours were allowed to develop for 3, 7, 10 and 17 days, with O(2) imaging experiments performed on live and euthanised animals at different time points. Despite a marked trend towards decreased O(2) in dead animals, their tumour areas produced phosphorescence lifetime values between 44 and 47 µs, which corresponded to hypoxic tissue with 5–20 μM O(2). After the O(2) imaging in animals, confocal Phosphorescence Lifetime Imaging Microscopy was conducted to examine the distribution of NanO2-IR probe in the tumours, which were excised, fixed and sliced for the purpose. The probe remained visible as bright and discrete ‘islands’ embedded in the tumour tissue until day 17 of tumour growth. Overall, this O(2) macro-imaging method using NanO2-IR holds promise for long-term studies with grafted tumours in live animal models, providing quantitative 2D mapping of tissue O(2).