Fig. 6: In vivo imaging of mtDNA mutations in a mouse model using InCasor.

a Schematic of intratumoral injection of InCasor_ND4 or InCasor_ND4-2-MT into a mouse model bearing either a HepG2 (WT) or MDA-MB-231 (MT) tumor to detect 12084 C > T mtDNA mutations in vivo. b In vivo imaging of different tumor-bearing mice after injection of InCasor_ND4 or InCasor_ND4-2-MT. The experiment was independently repeated three times with similar results. c Evaluation of the fluorescence intensity of dissected mouse tumor tissue. n = 3, data show mean ± SD. The length and width of the slices are both 2000 µm. d Schematic of tail vein injection of InCasor_ND5-MT-0 or InCasor_ND5-MT-1 into a dual-tumor mouse model (bearing a HepG2 tumor (WT) on the left and an MDA-MB-231 tumor (MT) on the right) to detect the 13105 A > G mtDNA mutation in vivo. e Time course analysis of fluorescence intensity in the dual-tumor mouse model illustrated in (d). Fluorescence signals were detected only in MT tumors over 8 h after tail vein injection of InCasor_ND5-MT-1, indicating improved specificity compared with that of InCasor_ND5-MT-0 (which produced fluorescence signals in both tumors). n = 3 biologically independent samples. f Representative images of the tumor tissue and tumor tissue sections dissected from (e). Scale bar: 25 μm. g Images of dissected liver tissue from mice 8 h after intravenous injection of InCasor showing obvious white nodules and fluorescence signals. h Hematoxylin and eosin (HE) and immunohistochemical staining of liver tissue sections from the liver in (g). Immunohistochemically stained liver tissue sections are shown on the right. The green, red, and blue colors correspond to Arginase-1, the Cy5 reporter from InCasor_ND5-MT-1 and DAPI, respectively. The white dotted lines separate the tumor lesions (T) from normal tissue. The scale bars correspond to 2000 µm (0.8× images) and 200 µm (5× images). Source data from c are provided as a Source Data file.