19 Fa nd 1 H MRI detection of amyloid b plaques in vivo

Formation of senile plaquescomposed of amyloidb peptide, a pathological hallmark of Alzheimer disease, in human brains precedes disease onset by many years. Noninvasive detection of such plaques could be critical in presymptomatic diagnosis and could contribute to early preventive treatmentstrategies. Using amyloid precursor protein(APP) transgenic mice as a model of amyloidb amyloidosis, we demonstrate here that an intravenously administered 19 F-containing amyloidophilic compound labels brain plaques and allows them to be visualized in living mice by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) using 19 F and 1 H. Our findings provide a new direction for specific noninvasive amyloidimaging without the danger of exposure to radiation. This approach could be used in longitudinal studies in mouse models of Alzheimer disease to search for biomarkers associated with amyloidb pathology as well as to track disease course after treatment with