A decade of ubiquicidin development for PET imaging of infection: A systematic review.

Biljana Marjanovic-Painter, Janke Kleynhans, Jan Rijn Zeevaart, Egmont Rohwer, Thomas Ebenhan

Journal: Nuclear medicine and biology 2023;116-117():108307

PMID: 36435145

Full Text on Elsevier Science View on PubMed

Abstract

BACKGROUND

Ubiquicidin is a peptide fragment with selective binding to negatively charged bacterial cell membranes. Besides its earlier labelling with gamma emitting radionuclides, it has been labelled with Positron Emission Tomography (PET) radionuclides in the last decade for imaging infection and distinguishing infectious disease from sterile inflammation. This systematic review aims to evaluate the technology readiness level of PET based ubiquicidin radiopharmaceuticals.

METHODS

Two independent researchers reviewed all articles and abstracts pertaining ubiquicidin and PET imaging that are currently available. Scopus, Google Scholar and PubMed/Medline were used in the search. Upon completion of the literature search all articles and abstracts were evaluated and duplicates were excluded. All non-PET articles as well as review articles without new data were deemed ineligible.

RESULTS

From a total of 17 papers and 10 abstracts the studies were grouped into development, preclinical and clinical studies. Development was published in 15/17 (88%) publications and 6/10 (60%) abstracts, preclinical applications in 9/17 (53%) publications and 1/10 (10%) of abstracts. Finally, clinical studies made up 6/17 (35%) of full publications and 4/10 (40%) of the available abstracts. Development results were the most abundant. All the findings in the different areas of development of ubiquicidin as PET radiopharmaceutical are summarized in this paper.

CONCLUSION

Labelling procedures are generally uncomplicated and relatively fast and there are indications of adequate product stability. The production of PET radiopharmaceuticals based on UBI will therefore not be a barrier for clinical introduction of this technology. Systematization and unification of criteria for preclinical imaging and larger clinical trials are needed to ensure the translation of this radiopharmaceutical into the clinic. Therefore a conclusion with regards to the clinical relevance of ubiquicidin based PET is not yet possible.

Address: Radiochemistry, The South African Nuclear Energy Corporation, Pelindaba, South Africa.; Nuclear Medicine Research Infrastructure NPC, Pretoria, South Africa.; Radiochemistry, The South African Nuclear Energy Corporation, Pelindaba, South Africa; Nuclear Medicine Research Infrastructure NPC, Pretoria, South Africa.; Department of Chemistry, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa.; Radiochemistry, The South African Nuclear Energy Corporation, Pelindaba, South Africa; Department of Nuclear Medicine, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa; Nuclear Medicine Research Infrastructure NPC, Pretoria, South Africa. Electronic address: [email protected].

DOI: 10.1016/j.nucmedbio.2022.11.001

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MeSH Terms: Humans, Radiopharmaceuticals, Positron-Emission Tomography, Ribosomal Proteins, Inflammation