19F applications in drug development and imaging - a review

To control drugs in vivo, new approaches are needed. Considerable progress has been made towards the applications of fluorine (F-19) in pharmacotherapy in this regard. To date, many authors have showed that by using F-19 labelled drugs and non-invasive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques together, drug biodistribution can be tracked. This review presents methods for F-19 incorporation into pharmaceuticals by forming C-F bonds and drug fluorine oil-water emulsions. Inadequate drug delivery is a major cause of drug resistance, which can be improved using approaches discussed herein aided by F-19 MRI. (C) 2014 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.