Authors: Zhuoyao Wu, Weiwei Zeng, Weitao Yang, Jinyan Yi, Dinghua Liu, Yan Xu, Chang Liu, Kexin Bian, Hui Wang, Bingbo Zhang
Published: 2025-03-12
Source: Full article
Liver fibrosis is an inevitable stage in the progression of most chronic liver diseases. Early diagnosis and treatment of liver fibrosis are crucial for effectively managing chronic liver conditions. However, there lacks a noninvasive and sensitive imaging method capable of early assessing fibrosis activity. Here, we report a molecular magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) probe for imaging fibroblast activation protein (FAP), which is overexpressed on activated hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) even in very early fibrotic livers. This method relies on FAP-catalyzed in situ self-assembly of its substrate probe that leads to the increase of the rotational correlation time (τ