Copyright
©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jul 21, 2016; 22(27): 6127-6134
Published online Jul 21, 2016. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v22.i27.6127
Published online Jul 21, 2016. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v22.i27.6127
Alpha-fetoprotein-targeted reporter gene expression imaging in hepatocellular carcinoma
Kwang Il Kim, Ju Hui Park, Yong Jin Lee, Joo Hyun Kang, Molecular Imaging Research Center, Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences, Seoul 01812, South Korea
Hye Kyung Chung, Yong Jin Lee, Joo Hyun Kang, Korea Drug Development Platform using Radio-Isotope, Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences, Seoul 01812, South Korea
Author contributions: Kim KI and Park JH performed the experiments and contributed to writing the article; Chung HK contributed to writing the article; Lee YJ contributed critical revisions to the article and intellectual discussions; and Kang JH designed the study and contributed to writing the article.
Supported by Korea Science and Engineering Foundation, No. 2012M2A2A7013480 and No. 2013M2C2A1074238.
Conflict-of-interest statement: None of the authors has any conflict of interest in relation to this study or publication of its findings.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Joo Hyun Kang, PhD, Molecular Imaging Research Center, Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences, 75 Nowon-ro, Nowon-gu, Seoul 01812, South Korea. kang2325@kirams.re.kr
Telephone: +82-2-9701339 Fax: +82-2-9701341
Received: March 25, 2016
Peer-review started: March 25, 2016
First decision: April 14, 2016
Revised: May 2, 2016
Accepted: May 21, 2016
Article in press: May 23, 2016
Published online: July 21, 2016
Peer-review started: March 25, 2016
First decision: April 14, 2016
Revised: May 2, 2016
Accepted: May 21, 2016
Article in press: May 23, 2016
Published online: July 21, 2016
Core Tip
Core tip: It is essential to establish an appropriate animal model of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) for monitoring the disease progression and evaluating therapeutic interventions with anticancer drugs. Reporter gene-based molecular imaging can elucidate tumor-specific events or processes through acquisition of images of reporter gene expression driven by tumor-specific enhancers/promoters. In this paper, we describe the advantages and disadvantages of various animal models of HCC and present images of in vivo reporter gene expression controlled by alpha-fetoprotein enhancer/promoter in the various HCC animal models.