Project area A: immune cell targeting

This project area develops chemical, biochemical and bioorthogonal targeting strategies to label innate immune cells for image-based tracking and analyses of their activation and functional state and to image bacteria. Novel versatile labels for multiscale imaging will uniquely allow detection of identical target moieties in different imaging modalities, thereby providing chemical bridging for multiscale imaging in Project Areas B and C. Furthermore, mathematical modelling will allow optimised motion compensation during intravital imaging of moving organs (e.g. cardiac and respiratory motion) and a quantitative description of immune cell dynamics from multiscale imaging data. Data from all modalities will be integrated into multiscale datasets.

Projects

• A01 – Cell-type specific multiscale imaging of leukocytes through the combination of protein tagging and radiochemical labelling
  Principal investigators: Christian Paul Konken, Henning Mootz
  Former principal investigator: Andrea Rentmeister
  Project term: 01/2021–12/2028
• A02 – Tailored coordination compounds as multimodal labels for multiscale imaging of mesenteric pathogen transport
  Principal investigators: Stefanie Bobe, Cristian A. Strassert
  Project term: 01/2021–12/2028
• A03 – Targeting of S100A8/A9 for imaging of inflammatory disorders
  Principal investigators: Andreas Faust, Günter Fritz
  Project term: 01/2021–12/2028
• A04 – Metabolic targeting of bacteria through complex carbohydrates and siderophores
  Principal investigators: Andreas Faust, Silke Niemann
  Former principal investigator: Ryan Gilmour
  Project term: 01/2021–12/2028
• A05 – Targeting immune cell dynamics by longitudinal whole-body imaging and mathematical modelling
  Principal investigators: Klaus Schäfers, Benedikt Wirth
  Project term: 01/2021–12/2028
• A06 – Improving intravital microscopy of inflammatory cell response by active motion compensation using controlled adaptive optics
  Principal investigators: Thomas Huser, Benedikt Wirth
  Project term: 01/2021–12/2028
• A07 – Image-guided tumour therapies with CAR T cells co-engineered for local depletion of immunosuppressive macrophages
  Principal investigator: Claudia Rössig
  Project term: 01/2025–12/2028

Completed projects

• PI-2023-02: Photoproximity labeling catalysts as signal amplification tools for in vivo labeling of immune cells
  Project leaders: Nadine Heiden (European Institute for Molecular Imaging) and Jonas Schöning (Institute of Biochemistry)
  Project term: 01/2024 - 12/2024
• PEP-2023-03: Cell-cell collisions augment collective swarm dynamics in immune cells
  Principal investigator: Milos Galic (Institute of Medical Physics and Biophysics)
  Project term: 07/2023–06/2024
• PEP-2022-12 – Chemiluminescent activation of optogenetic proteins for the targeting sites of inflammation
  Principal investigator: Seraphine Wegner (Institute of Physiological Chemistry and Pathobiochemistry)
  Project term: 01/2023–12/2023
• PEP-2022-09 – All-in-one cell therapy of tumors combining antigen-specific T cell activation with local depletion of immunosuppressive macrophages: Visualization of local CSF1R antagonist secretion in tumors
  Principal investigator: Claudia Rössig (Department of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology)
  Project term: 01/2023–12/2023
• ST-2022-03 – A ¹⁸F-labeled derivative of dibenzocylcooctyne (DBCO) to label artificial cholesterol analogs in cell membranes
  Project leader: Christian Paul Konken (Department of Nuclear Medicine)
  Project term: 01/2023 - 12/2023

• ST-2022-05 – Evaluation of immunogenicity of chemo-enzymatically modified Cap 1 mRNAs
  Project leader: Melissa van Dülmen (Institute of Biochemistry)
  Project term: 01/2023 - 12/2023