Canadian Researchers Produce Isotopes Essential to Medical Imaging in Cyclotrons

Researchers have devised a way to produce isotopes, which are essential to medical imaging technology, in a type of particle accelerator that some hospitals have, according to a news release.

Researchers from TRIUMF and the Cancer Agency in British Columbia and the Lawson Health Research Institute and Centre for Probe Development and Commercialization in Ontario produced isotope technetium-99m in a cyclotron rather than the traditional method of using a nuclear reactor, where more than 95 percent of the world's medical isotope supply is produced. This technology could allow hospitals to produce their own isotopes.

Technetium-99m is used in radiopharmaceuticals for imaging disease in the heart, bones and elsewhere in the body. Two nuclear reactors currently produce three-quarters of the global supply, and the reactors are aging and have experienced maintenance issues.

"Making medical isotopes in hospitals instead of nuclear reactors is a major milestone for diagnostic imaging for patients in Canada and around the world," Paul Schaffer, head of TRIUMF’s Nuclear Medicine Division and one of the team leaders said in the release. "We took the principles of physics, chemistry and engineering that people have known for years and used them to write a recipe for upgrading a cyclotron so it could be used to make technetium-99m. We've just completed using that recipe on machines in both Ontario and British Columbia."

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