TY - JOUR T1 - Pre-clinical Validation of Orthotopically-implanted Pulmonary Tumor by Imaging with <sup>18</sup>F-Fluorothymidine-Positron Emission Tomography/Computed Tomography JF - Anticancer Research JO - Anticancer Res SP - 4741 LP - 4749 VL - 33 IS - 11 AU - HIROSHI FUSHIKI AU - SOSUKE MIYOSHI AU - AKIHIRO NODA AU - YOSHIHIRO MURAKAMI AU - HIROSHI SASAKI AU - MAKOTO JITSUOKA AU - KEISUKE MITSUOKA AU - ICHIRO MATSUNARI AU - SHINTARO NISHIMURA Y1 - 2013/11/01 UR - http://ar.iiarjournals.org/content/33/11/4741.abstract N2 - The development of positron-emission tomography (PET) and X-ray computed tomography (CT) imaging has improved the detection of tumor burden and, in turn, pre-clinical drug development and clinical treatment. In pre-clinical drug development, clinically-relevant murine cancer models, such as orthotopic models of lung cancer, have provided an accurate representation of tumor burden in humans. However, evidence demonstrating the capability of imaging-guided evaluation of these clinically-relevant models is limited. Here, we combined 18F-fluorothymidine (FLT)-PET/CT imaging and a murine model of human non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) to improve the accuracy of anticancer drug evaluation in pre-clinical studies. We found that FLT-PET/CT imaging enabled the progression of pulmonary tumors to be longitudinally monitored rather than FDG-PET/CT. Furthermore, in an efficacy study of a standard treatment of docetaxel in a murine lung cancer model, FLT-PET imaging detected the anticancer response earlier than volumetric analysis by CT imaging. We, thus, observed a relationship between the alteration of FLT signals and Ki-67 index in the pulmonary tumor during the period of chemotherapy. These results indicate that the combination of FLT-PET/CT imaging and an orthotopic NSCLC model is an effective strategy for evaluating clinical efficacy and potential of an anticancer agent during pre-clinical development. ER -