University of Pittsburgh

Upmc

Xucai Chen

Flordeliza Villanueva

Jianjun Wang

William Richard Wagner

John J Pacella

Francois T H Yu

Andrew Fisher

Catalin Toma

Stephen D'Auria

Francois Tchi Ho Yu

Thiruganesh Ramasamy

Villanueva Flordeliza

Qin Bin

Joon S Lee

Disclosed herein are embodiments of a functionalized microbubble designed for treating and/or preventing vascular obstructions, including microvascular obstructions. The functionalized microbubble embodiments comprise a microbubble that can be activated upon exposure to ultrasound and further that has a lipid-based shell that is attached to an exteriorly-attached therapeutically active agent, such as a thrombolytic agent. Also disclosed herein are embodiments of a method for making and using the functionalized microbubble embodiments.

Functionalized microbubble embodiments for ultrasound-mediated treatment and methods of making and using the same

The systems and methods disclosed herein relate generally to microbubble-assisted delivery of a therapeutic agent, such as a chemotherapeutic agent, to cells or tissue of interest, either in vitro or in vivo, that can be activated by directed ultrasound irradiation. For example, hydrophobic sonosensitizers can be incorporated in microbubble complexes to provide improved sonodynamic therapies.

Sonodynamic therapy using microbubbles and pulsed wave ultrasound methods and systems

Various methods of performing ultrasound contrast assisted therapy are provided. One such method includes delivering a plurality of microbubble-based ultrasound contrast agents to a target area and disrupting the microbubble-based ultrasound contrast agents by delivering tone bursts of ultrasound to the target area. The oscillation of the microbubble-based ultrasound contrast agents can be achieved by delivering ultrasound tone bursts of greater than 5 acoustic cycles with a pulse repetition frequency of between 0.01 and 20 Hz, with pressure greater than 0.3 MPa.

Methods and devices for ultrasound contrast-assisted therapy

A method of imaging a blood vessel includes delivering a bubble-based contrast agent within the vessel and positioning at least one ultrasound device in the vicinity of the bubble-based contrast agent within the vessel. A first burst of low-frequency ultrasound energy can be delivered to excite the bubble-based contrast agent into oscillation within the vessel, and a second burst of high-frequency ultrasound energy can be delivered at the excited bubble-based contrast agent. A return signal from the burst of high-frequency ultrasound energy can be received and processed to obtain one or more images.

Contrast assisted intravascular ultrasound imaging

This invention addresses the clinical problem of how to optimize biological cell based therapies, such as stem cell therapy. Currently, cell therapies administered by intravenous, intra-arterial, and/or direct tissue injection are limited by the lack of clinically available imaging methods to detect the in vivo fate of the administered cells. There are many efforts underway to develop imaging strategies for stem cells in vivo, including radionuclide and MRI-based approaches. However, these approaches are limited by potential safety issues (e.g. radioactive exposure of stem cells, toxicity of iron particles used for MRI) and difficulty in serial tracking due to complex instrumentation and/or the requirement for repetitive radiation exposure.

Intracellular microbubble for imaging an anatomical site

The disclosed technology describes compositions and methods useful for providing cell based therapy. For example, one embodiment of cell based therapy involves the regeneration of injured tissue and/or promoting wound healing. Certain embodiments provide improved therapeutic compositions using microbubbles by delivering biological progenitor cells to the injured tissues. The administration of the microbubbles is directed by acoustic radiation forces that interact with embodiments of microbubbles comprising an acoustically active gas. As such, a high efficiency of progenitor cell delivery to injured tissue is realized. One advantage of this technique over targeted delivery of pharmaceutical compounds, is that the delivered progenitors cells may be derived from the patient (i.e., personalized therapy), thereby avoiding side effects, allergic reactions, and overall problems associated with refractive drug responses.

Growing community of inventors

Pittsburgh, PA, United States of America

Xucai Chen