Title:
In vivo imaging of tumor microenvironment and strategies for targeting tumor hypoxia

Shinae Kizaka-Kondoh
Tokyo Institute of Technology Graduate School of Bioscience and Biotechnology

Abstract:
Rapidly growing tumors experience hypoxia due to insufficient and defective vascularization. Hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF) is transcription factor that mediates the adaptive response to decreased O₂ availability at the cellular and organismal levels and plays key roles in a number of diseases, including cancer. In cancers, HIF activity can be induced even under normoxic conditions by various reasons such as genetic alterations in oncogenes and excess growth signals. Many of the genes induced by HIF are critically involved in aspects of cancer biology, including vascularization, metabolic reprogramming, autocrine growth factor signaling, invasion/metastasis and resistance to treatment. Therefore, HIF-active tumor microenvironment may become a general marker for early detection and treatment of malignant cancers.
In this lecture, I would like to introduce our challenges to target HIF-active microenvironment by using fusion protein drugs. I also introduce in vivo optical imaging systems that we have developed to explore HIF-activity and inflammatory responses in tumors.

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