Nuclear medicine examinations for imaging
gliomas have been introduced into clinical practice to evaluate the grade of
malignancy and determine sampling locations for biopsies. However, these modalities have some limitations.
Tissue factor (TF) is overexpressed in various types of
cancers, including
gliomas. We thus generated an anti-human TF
monoclonal antibody (mAb) clone 1849. In the present study, immunohistochemistry performed on
glioma specimens using anti-TF 1849 mAb showed that TF expression in
gliomas increased in proportion to the grade of
malignancy based on the World Health Organization (WHO) classification, and TF was remarkably expressed in
necrosis and pseudopalisading cells, the histopathological hallmarks of
glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). Furthermore, in both fluorescence and single-photon emission computed tomography/computed tomography (SPECT/CT) imaging studies, anti-TF 1849
IgG efficiently accumulated in TF-overexpressing intracranial tumours in mice. Although further investigation is required for a future clinical use of immuno-SPECT with 111In-labelled anti-TF 1849
IgG, the immuno-SPECT may represent a unique imaging modality that can visualize the
biological characteristics of
gliomas differently from those obtained using the existing imaging modalities and may be useful to evaluate the grade of
malignancy and determine sampling locations for biopsies in patients with
glioma, particularly GBM.