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Latest News
Researchers report fastest purification of astatine-211 needed for targeted cancer therapy
Astatine-211 recovery from bismuth metal using a chromatography system. Unlike bismuth, astatine-211 forms chemical bonds with ketones.
In a recent study, Texas A&M University researchers have described a new process to purify astatine-211, a promising radioactive isotope for targeted cancer treatment. Unlike other elaborate purification methods, their technique can extract astatine-211 from bismuth in minutes rather than hours, which can greatly reduce the time between production and delivery to the patient.
“Astatine-211 is currently under evaluation as a cancer therapeutic in clinical trials. But the problem is that the supply chain for this element is very limited because only a few places worldwide can make it,” said Jonathan Burns, research scientist in the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station’s Nuclear Engineering and Science Center. “Texas A&M University is one of a handful of places in the world that can make astatine-211, and we have delineated a rapid astatine-211 separation process that increases the usable quantity of this isotope for research and therapeutic purposes.”
The researchers added that this separation method will bring Texas A&M one step closer to being able to provide astatine-211 for distribution through the Department of Energy’s Isotope Program’s National Isotope Development Center as part of the University Isotope Network.
Details on the chemical reaction to purify astatine-211 are in the journal Separation and Purification Technology.
D. J. Alexander, J. C. Cooley, B. J. Cameron, L. B. Dauelsberg, R. M. Dickerson, R. E. Hackenberg, M. E. Mauro, A. Nobile, Jr., P. A. Papin, G. Rivera
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 49 | Number 4 | May 2006 | Pages 796-801
Technical Paper | Target Fabrication | dx.doi.org/10.13182/FST06-A1203
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Work is underway at Los Alamos National Laboratory to fabricate machined-and-bonded target capsules of Be-6 wt% Cu for the National Ignition Facility. Significant progress has been made in producing material with the desired composition, purity, and homogeneity of composition, by arc melting. This material is thermomechanically processed by equal channel angular extrusion, to break down the coarse ascast structure and refine the grain size, to about 20 m. Machining with diamond tooling results in a significant improvement of the as-machined roughness, that also results in improved bond strengths. Bonding with a sputtered layer of Al can achieve high strengths with a bond 1.2 m thick, and thinner bonds are being investigated. Laser-drilled holes and fill-tube counterbores produced by electrodischarge machining appear to be feasible, but will require improvements in specimen positioning.