Amine-assisted catechol-based nanocoating on ultrasmall iron oxide nanoparticles for high-resolution T1 angiography

Hyunhong Kim; Sunyoung Woo; Hoesu Jung; Hyo-Suk Ahn; Ning Chen; HyungJoon Cho; Jongnam Park

doi:10.1039/d2na00861k

Amine-assisted catechol-based nanocoating on ultrasmall iron oxide nanoparticles for high-resolution T₁ angiography

Nanoscale Adv. 2023 May 9;5(12):3368-3375. doi: 10.1039/d2na00861k. eCollection 2023 Jun 13.

Authors

Hyunhong Kim¹, Sunyoung Woo¹, Hoesu Jung², Hyo-Suk Ahn^{3

4}, Ning Chen¹, HyungJoon Cho⁵, Jongnam Park^{1

5}

Affiliations

¹ School of Energy and Chemical Engineering, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology Unist-gil 50 (100 Banyeon-ri), Eonyang-eup, Uljugun Ulsan Metropolitan City 689-798 Republic of Korea jnpark@unist.ac.kr.
² Preclinical Research Center, Daegu-Gyeongbuk Medical Innovation Foundation (KMEDIhub) Daegu South Korea.
³ Division of Cardiology, Department of Internal Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea, Uijeongbu St. Mary's Hospital Uijeongbu Korea.
⁴ Catholic Research Institute for Intractable Cardiovascular Disease (CRID), College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea Seoul Republic of Korea.
⁵ Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology Unist-gil 50 (100 Banyeon-ri), Eonyang-eup, Uljugun Ulsan Metropolitan City 689-798 Republic of Korea.

Abstract

Surface engineered iron oxide nanoparticles (IONPs) with catecholic ligands have been investigated as alternative T₁ contrast agents. However, complex oxidative chemistry of catechol during IONP ligand exchange causes surface etching, heterogeneous hydrodynamic size distribution, and low colloidal stability because of Fe³⁺ mediated ligand oxidation. Herein, we report highly stable and compact (∼10 nm) Fe³⁺ rich ultrasmall IONPs functionalized with a multidentate catechol-based polyethylene glycol polymer ligand through amine-assisted catecholic nanocoating. The IONPs exhibit excellent stability over a broad range of pHs and low nonspecific binding in vitro. We also demonstrate that the resultant NPs have a long circulation time (∼80 min), enabling high resolution T₁ magnetic resonance angiography in vivo. These results suggest that the amine assisted catechol-based nanocoating opens a new potential of metal oxide NPs to take a step forward in exquisite bio-application fields.