Visualization of cell death in vivo with the annexin A5 imaging protocol.

Annexin A5 binds to phosphatidylserine (PS), which is one of the "eat me" signals at the surface of the apoptotic cell. This property has been the driving force for the research of annexin A5 as a probe to measure apoptosis in vitro and in vivo. A non-invasive imaging protocol using annexin A5 has been developed and applied successfully to measure programmed cell death programmed cell death (PCD) in patients. This review highlights the aspects of this development and discusses clinical relevance, limitations and future perspectives of this approach of visualizing cell death.