Released on: January 23, 2008, 3:50 pm

Press Release Author: GTCbio

Industry: Pharmaceuticals

Press Release Summary: Dr. Hisataka Kobayashi, Chief Scientist of Molecular Imaging
at the National Cancer Institute will speak at GTCbio's 3rd Imaging in Pre-clinical
& Clinical Drug Development conference March 17-18, 2008 in San Diego, CA.

Press Release Body: Dr. Hisataka Kobayashi, Chief Scientist of Molecular Imaging at
the National Cancer Institute will speak at GTCbio's 3rd Imaging in Pre-clinical &
Clinical Drug Development conference March 17-18, 2008 in San Diego, CA.

Dr. Kobayashi will discuss environment sensitive \"smart\" imaging probe for
super-specific cancer cell detection.

A major goal of targeted molecular imaging of cancer is to improve the sensitivity
and specificity so that even minimal clusters of aberrant cells can be detected in
vivo thus permitting earlier intervention. Because the target?in this case a
tumor?is only detectable in reference to its background, the most common strategies
to improve imaging involve increasing the signal from the target tissue while
assuming the background signal will remain constant. One strategy to achieve highly
specific and sensitive monitoring of targeted cancer cells, would be to combine the
desirable target binding characteristics of a monoclonal antibody with a signaling
molecule, which is only activated within cancer cells, thus reducing background
signal. Herein, we propose a fluorescence-based activatable "smart" strategy of
maximizing target signal while minimizing or eliminating the background signal. With
this activatable imaging strategy, we have designed and synthesized a series of
activatable "smart" cancer-targeting probes, and achieved target specific cancer
imaging with extremely low background signal while clearly depicting peritoneally
disseminated micro-metastasis and lung micro-metastasis with extremely high
sensitivity and specificity.

Dr. Kobayahsi's presentation will look at new cancer-cell specific molecular imaging
strategy for performing super-specific cancer detection, the design and synthesis of
fluorescence-based activatable "smart" probes for the cancer molecular imaging, the
detection of micro-metastasis of cancer with super-high sensitivity, practical
clinical application for endoscopy-based imaging or surgery-assistance, and possible
real-time specific monitoring of viable cancer cells under treatment

Presenting organizations at the 3rd Imaging in Pre-clinical & Clinical Drug
Development conference include GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, Abbott, Schering-Plough,
Bristol-Myers Squibb, GE Healthcare, Siemens, NIH, UCLA, 3-D Imaging, and more.

The 3rd Imaging in Pre-clinical & Clinical Drug Development conference features
presentations on novel imaging methods and technology, imaging in drug development
and therapy, imaging applications in CNS, imaging applications in oncology and
imaging applications in the cardiovascular system. For more information, visit
www.gtcbio.com.


ABOUT GTCbio

GTCbio organizes conferences specifically for the biomedical and biopharmaceutical
industries. Our goal is to facilitate the exchange of biopharmaceutical and
biomedical intelligence between industry leaders, academic and government
organizations, and the financial community.

GTCbio is a subsidiary of Global Technology Community, LLC, a privately held company
founded in 2002.

Contact: GTCBIO (626) 256-6405, (626) 256-6460 fax, customerservices@gtcbio.com


Web Site: http://www.gtcbio.com

Contact Details: GTCbio
434 W Foothill Blvd.
Monrovia, CA 91016