Radionuclide development

ANSTO LifeSciences radionuclide development capabilities and facilities allow us to develop radionuclide techniques, support internal and external partners, investigate radionuclide generator technologies and develop quality control and assurance technologies.

• Develops irradiation, isolation and purification techniques and technologies for medically relevant radionuclides produced by either a nuclear reactor or cyclotron.
• Provides existing radionuclide support to ANSTO LifeSciences and external partners and collaborators.
• Investigates and develops technologies for radionuclide generator development.
• Develops quality control and quality assurance techniques on reactor and cyclotron produced radionuclides.
• Supports the other ANSTO units' and divisions' production capabilities and product development.

Capabilities

• Reactor produced radionuclides and targetry
• Cyclotron produced radionuclides and targetry
• Chemical and chromatographic separation techniques for various radionuclides from their target materials
• Radionuclidic purity assessment by gamma spectrometry
• Radiochemical purity assessment by HPLC, TLC
• Radiolabelling of small molecules and peptides with various radionuclides
• Chemical purity assessment (ICP-MS)
• Automation for radionuclide handling and separation including reactor, cyclotron and generator produced radionuclides
• Organic and inorganic sorbent materials for radionuclide separations

Other capabilities

• Development of automated procedures for commercialisation of products
• Training/Teaching
• Provide Research isotopes developed at ANSTO for further evaluation

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Facilities

Our radionuclide development capabilities are supported by radiochemistry laboratories located at ANSTO. We also have access to two low (7-9 x10¹³ n/cm²/sec) and one high (2.5 x 10¹⁴ n/cm²/sec) flux positions at the OPAL reactor. In addition, we have an agreement with Austin Health/Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research (LICR) to use their Cyclotron to produce isotopes, beginning in August 2011.

Isotope access

• Custom irradiations in OPAL Reactor for SPECT and therapeutic radioisotopes.
• Development of a ⁶⁸Ge/⁶⁸Ga generator
• Automated ¹⁷⁷Lu isolation process to produce high (~2000 GBq/mg) and low specific (~555 GBq/mg) activity ¹⁷⁷LuCl₃
• ANSTO/Austin-LICR partnership (⁶⁴Cu,¹²⁴I, ⁸⁶Y, ⁸⁹Zr)
• Future Developments (⁶⁷Cu, ⁷², ⁷⁴, ⁷⁶, ⁷⁷As, ⁹⁰Y, ¹⁸⁸Re, ^191m Ir, ¹⁹⁹Au, ¹⁰³Pd.

Equipment available

• Gamma Spectrometer with HPGe detector
• Capintec Dose Calibrator
• TLC Scanner
• Computer monitored chromatography systems (Empower2 software with radiation detectors).
• Computer monitored chromatography system (Laura software with radiation detector installed in glove box).
• Titratometer
• Shielded glove box with fume extraction
• Lu-177 chromatography system with semi-automation (adaptable for other separations)
• Ampoule cracking unit with semi-automation
• Sample digestion unit
• UV-Visible Spectrophotometer
• Custom shielded fume hood with lead glass installation
• Access to ICP-Mass Spectrometer, ICP-OES and Ion chromatography (onsite)

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Related research

Areas of interest

• New technologies to improve and decrease time for radionuclide isolation and purification.
• Automated purification technology to improve both the safety and reliability of radionuclide isolation.
• Development of novel organic and inorganic sorbents for simple and rapid purification of radionuclides.
• Development of methods to improve the specific activity of purified radionuclides.

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