Detection of Anticancer Drug-Induced Cardiotoxicity Using VCAM1-Targeted Nanoprobes

Chemotherapy-induced cardiac toxicity is an undesirable yet very common effect that increases the risk of death and reduce the quality of life of individuals undergoing chemotherapy. However, no feasible methods and techniques are available to monitor and detect the degree of cardiotoxicity at an early stage. Therefore, in this project, we aim to develop a fluorescent nanoprobe to image the toxicity within the cardiac tissue induced by an anticancer drug. We have observed that vascular cell adhesion molecule 1 (VCAM1) protein alone with collagen was overly expressed within the heart, when an animal was treated with doxorubicin (DOX), because of inflammation in the epithelial cells. We hypothesize that developing a VCAM1-targeted peptide-based (VHPKQHRGGSKGC) fluorescent nanoprobe can detect and visualize the affected heart. In this regard, we prepared a poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) nanoparticle linked with VCAM1 peptide and rhodamine B (PLGA–VCAM1–RhB). Selective binding and higher accumulation of the PLGA–VCAM1–RhB nanoprobes were detected in DOX-treated human cardiomyocyte cells (HCMs) compared to the untreated cells. For in vivo studies, DOX (5 mg/kg) was injected via the tail vein once in two weeks for 6 weeks (3 injection total). PLGA–VCAM1–RhB and PLGA–RhB were injected via the tail vein after 1 week of the last dose of DOX, and images were taken 4 h after administration. A higher fluorescent signal of PLGA–RhB–VCAM-1 (48.62% ± 12.79%) was observed in DOX-treated animals compared to the untreated control PLGA–RhB (10.61% ± 4.90) within the heart, indicating the specificity and targeting ability of PLGA–VCAM1–RhB to the inflamed tissues. The quantified fluorescence intensity of the homogenized cardiac tissue of PLGA–RhB–VCAM1 showed 156% higher intensity than the healthy control group. We conclude that PLGA–VCAM1–RhB has the potential to bind inflamed cardiac cells, thereby detecting DOX-induced cardiotoxicity and damaged heart at an early stage.