Trifunctional Activity-Based Probe

Development of Trifunctional Actvity-Based Probe for Targeted and Multiplexed Imaging in vivo

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Protease activity contributes to all cancer hallmarks. Thus, converting protease activity in cancer progression into imaging readout has emerged as a promising detection strategy. Recently, several protease-targeting ABPs that fluoresce upon proteolytic cleavage have shown preclinical promise in imaging-based detection of lung, breast, and colon tumors, and have been utilized for in vivo surgical guidance for tumor excision. Despite these advances, there are several potential limitations: 1) the reduced signal intensity of fluorescence fragments due to fast in vivo clearance, and 2) poor diseases specificity stemming from the complexity of enzyme regulation and cleavage promiscuity, which can lead to false positive signals, We aim to address these challenges by developing trifunctinonal probe with enhanced localization and the capacity for multiplexed imaging.