Decafluorobutane

Ultrasound contrast agent intended for assessing myocardial perfusion in patients with coronary artery disease.

DECAFLUOROBUTANE (DFB) is used as a novel core material for phase-change contrast agents (PCCAs). Its mechanism of action is as follows: whilst DFB is naturally a gas at room temperature (boiling point –1.7 °C), it can be encapsulated within a lipid shell to form supercooled liquid nano- and micrometre-scale droplets that remain stable at physiological temperatures; when excited by ultrasonic energy, the droplets undergo acoustic droplet vapourisation (ADV), transforming into highly echogenic microbubbles, thereby producing ultrasonic contrast [1].

ChEBI: Perflubutane is a fluorocarbon that is butane in which all of the hydrogens have been replaced by fluorines. Microbubbles of preflubutane are used in the ultrasound contrast agent BR14. It has a role as an ultrasound contrast agent. It is a gas molecular entity, a fluorocarbon and a fluoroalkane.

[1] Sheeran, P. S., Wong, V. P., Luois, S., McFarland, R. J., Ross, W. D., Feingold, S., Matsunaga, T. O., Dayton, P. A. (2011). Decafluorobutane as a Phase-Change Contrast Agent for Low-Energy Extravascular Ultrasonic Imaging. Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology, 37 9, Pages 1518-1530. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2011.05.021