We report the synthesis and characterization of antifouling zwitterion carboxybetaine acrylamide (CBAA)-modified dendrimer-entrapped gold nanoparticles (Au DENPs) for enhanced CT imaging applications. The CBAA-modified nanodevice displays a better protein resistance property, less macrophage cellular uptake and liver accumulation, and longer blood half-delay time than the PEGylated counterpart material, thereby enabling enhanced blood pool, lymph node, and tumor CT imaging.

We report the design of the fourth generation poly(propylene imine) (PPI) glycodendrimers for magnetic resonance (MR) imaging applications. The glycodendrimers were designed to have a densely organized maltose shell (MAL DS) and several tetraazacyclododecane tetraacetic acid (DOTA) ligands that were attached to the periphery of the PPI dendrimers for Gd(iii) chelation. We show that the formed MAL DS-modified PPI dendrimers possess good cytocompatibility and hemocompatibility in the studied concentration range. With the longitudinal relaxivity (r) of PPI-MAL DS-DOTA(Gd) (10.2 mM s), which is 3.0 times higher than that of DOTA(Gd) (3.4 mM s), the developed PPI-MAL DS-DOTA(Gd) nanocomplexes can be used as an efficient contrast agent for MR imaging of cancer cells in vitro, and animal aorta, renal artery, kidney, and bladder in vivo. Furthermore, tissue distribution studies show that the glycodendrimer/Gd complexes are metabolized and cleared out of the body at 48 h post injection. The developed PPI-MAL DS-DOTA(Gd) may be further functionalized for MR imaging of different biological systems.

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