[68Ga]Ga-PSMA-11: The First FDA-Approved 68Ga-Radiopharmaceutical for PET Imaging of Prostate Cancer

Ute Hennrich; Matthias Eder

doi:10.3390/ph14080713

[⁶⁸Ga]Ga-PSMA-11: The First FDA-Approved ⁶⁸Ga-Radiopharmaceutical for PET Imaging of Prostate Cancer

Pharmaceuticals (Basel). 2021 Jul 23;14(8):713. doi: 10.3390/ph14080713.

Authors

Ute Hennrich¹, Matthias Eder^{2

3}

Affiliations

¹ German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Division of Radiology, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany.
² Division of Radiopharmaceutical Development, German Cancer Consortium (DKTK), Partner Site Freiburg, and German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), 69120 Heidelberg, Germany.
³ Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Medical Center Freiburg, Faculty of Medicine, University of Freiburg, 79106 Freiburg, Germany.

Abstract

For the positron emission tomography (PET) imaging of prostate cancer, radiotracers targeting the prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) are nowadays used in clinical practice. Almost 10 years after its discovery, [⁶⁸Ga]Ga-PSMA-11 has been approved in the United States by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as the first ⁶⁸Ga-radiopharmaceutical for the PET imaging of PSMA-positive prostate cancer in 2020. This radiopharmaceutical combines the peptidomimetic Glu-NH-CO-NH-Lys(Ahx)-HBED-CC with the radionuclide ⁶⁸Ga, enabling specific imaging of tumor cells expressing PSMA. Such a targeting approach may also be used for therapy planning as well as potentially for the evaluation of treatment response.

Keywords: PSMA; [68Ga]Ga-PSMA-11; positron emission tomography (PET); prostate cancer; theranostics.

Publication types

Review