Characterization of actinide resin for separation of 51,52gMn from bulk target material

Recycling of 52Cr electroplated targets for 52gMn production

52gMn is a promising radionuclide for positron emission tomography (PET). Enriched 52Cr targets are required to minimize formation of 54Mn radioisotopic impurities during production with proton beams. The need for radioisotopically pure 52gMn, accessibility and cost of 52Cr, sustainability of the radiochemical process, and potential for iterative purification of target materials motivate this development of recyclable, electroplated 52Cr metal targets and radiochemical isolation and labeling with resulting >99.89% radionuclidically pure 52gMn. The run-to-run replating efficiency is 60 ± 20%, and unplated chromium from this method is recovered with 94% efficiency as 52CrCl3 hexahydrate. The decay-corrected molar activity of chemically isolated 52gMn for common chelating ligands was 376 MBq/μmol.

The role of chemistry in accelerator-based production and separation of radionuclides as basis for radiolabelled compounds for medical applications

Radiochemical separations used in large scale routine production of diagnostic and therapeutic radionuclides at a particle accelerator for patient care are briefly outlined. The role of chemistry at various stages of development of a production route of a novel radionuclide, namely nuclear data measurement, high-current targetry, chemical processing and quality control of the product, is discussed in detail. Special attention is paid to production of non-standard positron emitters (e.g. 44gSc, 64Cu, 68Ga, etc.) at a cyclotron and novel therapeutic radionuclides (e.g. 67Cu, 225Ac, etc.) at an accelerator. Some typical examples of radiochemical methods involved are presented.