Working with molecules
Li and fellow bioengineering Professor Joel Spencer are working with molecules that emit visible light when excited by an X-ray beam. Their research is supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The researchers can determine how much oxygen is present in the tissue by analyzing the intensity of the light and the time it takes to be emitted.
Bio-tissue Oxygenation Enabled Sensing
Bio-tissue Oxygenation Enabled Sensing (BONES) is a brand-new medical imaging method that combines chemical sensitivity with high-spatial resolution imaging through deep tissue.
Under the Small Business Technology Transfer program, an industry-academia collaboration grant worth $1.9 million is available. The researchers utilize the power of a bright X-ray tube and a clever X-ray optics concentrating a superfine X-ray beam — thanks to a collaboration with Bay Area startup Si gray Inc. — to peer through thick tissue.
Many medical illnesses, such as cancer, chronic renal disease, and failed organ transplant, are affected by hypoxic (low oxygen) circumstances, but the heterogeneous nature of hypoxia is not well recognized, according to Li.
Bone marrow, for example, is a very hypoxic tissue, and its low-oxygen environment allows adult stem cells to thrive. However, cancer cells are thought to thrive under the same conditions, which is why bone is a popular cancer metastasis site.
Biomedical imaging
Li and Spencer both work in the field of biomedical imaging. The technique and process of imaging the interior of a body for clinical examination and medical intervention, as well as visual representation of the function of particular organs or tissues, is referred to as medical imaging (physiology).
Medical imaging aims to expose hidden interior structures beneath the skin and bones, as well as diagnose and cure disease. Medical imaging also creates a database of normal anatomy and physiology, allowing abnormalities to be detected. Although medical imaging of excised organs and tissues is possible, such operations are normally classified as pathology rather than medical imaging.
Spencer had already created a method for viewing stem cells in live, intact mice, but Li's notion for BONES would allow researchers to go even further inside to quantify molecular oxygen directly.
"Measuring oxygenation in deep tissue is difficult", Li explained. "Right present, we can extract samples with a needle, but it can only investigate one location." BONES, a planned new technology, will allow us to view into a large area of tissue like cancers and bone marrow.
Li and Spencer are both connected with the Health Sciences Research Institute, in addition to being colleagues in the Department of Bioengineering. The work on BONES will continue under this grant until 2024. It builds on work Li has done since arriving at campus in 2012, including a $2.5 million R01 grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop a first-of-its-kind X-ray luminescence tomography scanner that allows researchers to visualize how cancer progresses and monitor the effectiveness of novel drug delivery systems in live animals without invasive surgeries or euthanasia.
Advantages of novel drug delivery system
1)Because they are a natural part of the body, they are biodegradable.
2)Drug entrapment does not necessitate a chemical change of the material being entrapped.
3) They are susceptible and can be directed to specific disease tissues or organs.
4) They increase the drug's systemic action.
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