Differential diagnosis between inflammatory mass and malignant glioma is of great significance to patients, which is the basis for developing accurate individualized treatment. Due to the lack of non-invasive imaging characterization methods in the clinical application, the current diagnosis grading of glioma mainly depended on the pathological biopsy, which is complicated and risky. This study aims to develop a non-invasive imaging differential diagnosis method of glioma based on the reduction activated strategy of intracellular aggregation of sensitive superparamagnetic Fe₃O₄ nanoparticles (SIONPs). In vitro and in vivo magnetic resonance imaging results indicated that SIONPs could specifically increase the T₂ relaxation rate and enhance MR imaging in tumor with redox microenvironment by the response-aggregation in the tumorous site. In vivo experiments also demonstrate that the substantial improvement of T2-weighted imaging contrast could be used to differentiate inflammatory mass and malignant glioma. The reduction-active MR imaging contrast agent offers a new paradigm for designing “smart” MR imaging probes of differential diagnosis of the tumor.

炎性肿块与恶性神经胶质瘤的鉴别诊断对患者具有重要意义，这是发展准确个体化治疗的基础。由于临床应用中缺乏非侵入性影像学表征方法，目前对神经胶质瘤的诊断分级主要取决于病理活检，其复杂且危险。本研究旨在基于敏感超顺磁性Fe ₃ O ₄纳米颗粒（SIONPs）细胞内聚集的还原激活策略，开发一种神经胶质瘤的非侵入性成像鉴别诊断方法。体外和体内磁共振成像结果表明SIONPs可以特异性增加T ₂通过在肿瘤部位的反应聚集，在具有氧化还原微环境的肿瘤中提高松弛率并增强MR成像。体内实验还表明，T2加权成像对比度的显着改善可用于区分炎症块和恶性神经胶质瘤。具有还原活性的MR成像造影剂为设计用于鉴别诊断肿瘤的“智能” MR成像探针提供了新的范例。