The League Against Cancer supports research carried out at the CBM and the INEM

The committees of the Grand Ouest Cancer League bringing together Brittany, Pays de la Loire, Centre-Val de Loire and Poitou-Charentes pool their resources to support cancer researchers.

On Tuesday 7 February at the CBM, La Ligue contre le cancer officially presented a check for €146,000 to support 6 teams of researchers from the CBM and the INEM (Laboratory of Experimental and Molecular Immunology and Neurogenetics). The projects supported aim to quickly achieve concrete results for the benefit of patients.

The committees of Loiret (represented by its volunteer Administrator, Doctor Jean-Louis Vaur) and Eure-et-Loir (represented by its volunteer Vice-President Mr. Jacques Dautreme) were present. The Loir-et-Cher, Cher and Morbihan committees, which are also funders, could not be present but indicated that they were happy to be able to contribute to the financing of regional research.

Mr. Jean-Marc Schneider from La République du Center came to immortalize this moment by going around the table allowing everyone to present their project as well as the benefits and progress to come.

Eva Jakab Toth has received the “Rudolf Fabinyi” Prize of the Hungarian Chemical Society

Eva Jakab Toth, co-coordinator of the “Metal Complexes and MRI” team, has received the “Rudolf Fabinyi” Prize from the Hungarian Chemical Society.

This Prize, named after the founder and the first president of the Hungarian Chemical Society, is attributed to a chemist working abroad for his/her remarkable contribution to enhance the visibility of Hungarian chemical research. Eva Jakab Toth is the 10th person to receive this Prize.

The Prize ceremony took place on the 2nd Dec. 2022 in Debrecen, Hungary, followed by a scientific conference given by Eva Jakab Toth.

Bispidines and manganese: a winning couple

As an essential metal ion and an efficient relaxation agent, Mn2+ holds great promise as a substitute for Gd3+ in MRI contrast agent applications, if its stable and inert complexation can be achieved. To achieve this goal, the “Metal complexes and MRI” team of CBM and their collaborators from the University of Heidelberg, Germany, created a Mn2+ selective chelator by introducing four pyridine and one carboxylate donors on a bispidine skeleton. Thanks to a highly rigid and preorganized structure and perfect size-match for Mn2+, the new ligand L provides not only remarkably high thermodynamic stability, but also excellent selectivity over the major biological competitor Zn2+, as well as kinetic inertness. The unusual eight-coordinate structure of the Mn2+ complex, in contrast to the six-coordinate structure of the Zn2+ analogue, underlines that the coordination cavity is perfectly adapted for Mn2+, while it is too large for Zn2+. The MRI efficiency of this MnL complex is about 30% higher than that of typical Mn2+ systems. In vivo MRI experiments realized in control mice at a very low dose (0.02 mmol/kg) indicate good signal enhancement and fast renal clearance. Taken together, MnL is the first chelate that combines such excellent stability, selectivity, inertness and relaxation properties, all of primary importance for MRI use.

D. Ndiaye, P. Cieslik, H. Wadepohl, A. Pallier, S. Même, P. Comba, and É. Tóth, Mn2+ bispidine complex combining exceptional stability, inertness and MRI efficiency, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2022, doi : 10.1021/jacs.2c10108
JACS spotlight sur cet article : https://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/jacs.2c12719

2022, October, 14: Seminar of Manon Isaac

Séminaire de Manon Isaac, post-doctorante dans le groupe thématique "Complexes métalliques et IRM".

Abstract:

Zinc cations play a key role as a cofactor in gene transcription and metalloenzyme functions, but also in signaling pathways in the immune system, or during fertilization. To understand its underlying function, on top of the quantification of the total amount of zinc, the detection of the labile pool and its evolution is crucial. Whatever the technique is, probes are required to visualize labile zinc. The probes have to be optimized for a given technique but also for the biological context (e.g. extracellular vs intracellular).

Manon Isaac will present several tools to detect labile zinc developed during her PhD and postdocs: design and characterization of peptidic luminescent probes, the first steps towards a device to detect zinc released by the egg after in vitro fertilization, and MRI zinc probes.

 

4th scientific days of the GDR AIM

The 4th scientific days of the GDR AIM (gdraim.cnrs-orleans.fr) organized jointly with the RE1 of France Life Imaging will take place from October 03 to 05, 2022 in Orléans.

The program will take place over four half-days, from Monday October 3rd at 12:00 p.m. to Wednesday October 5th at 1:30 p.m.

With 90 registered participants and a rich program, these days will be a fine representation of French research in the chemistry of imaging probes.

We will also have the pleasure of welcoming 4 foreign speakers:

  • Kristina Djanashvili (Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands)
  • Christophe Portal (Edinburgh Molecular Imaging Ltd)
  • Gyula Tircso (Univ. of Debrecen, Hungary)
  • Carlos Platas (Univ. of Coruna, Spain)

See the programm

Eva Jakab Toth receives the “Torsten Almén” Award

Eva Jakab Toth, co-leader of the "Metal complexes and MRI" group, received the "Torsten Almén" Award for her pioneering research on contrast agents, from the "Contrast Media Research" committee of the World Molecular Imaging Society (WMIS).

This biannual prize rewards unique research activities that have shaped the field of contrast agents. Torsten Almén was a pioneer in the field of non-ionic contrast agents for radiography. His work forever revolutionized the research and clinical use of X-ray imaging agents. In the same spirit, the committee specifically identified "the creativity of the preclinical and translational work of Eva Jakab Toth, in the design, deep characterization and application of paramagnetic MRI contrast agents".

Eva Jakab Toth gave the “Torsten Almén Medal Award” lecture at the 2022 « Contrast Media Research » Symposium in Annapolis, Maryland (August 21-25, 2022).