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Research overview

The use of targeted radionuclides for diagnostics and therapy has focused on a few specific radionuclides for decades, but massive improvements in cancer therapy are possible by selecting different diagnostic and therapeutic isotopes. However, a current lack of supply in many medically relevant radionuclides limits the research and development into the use of these, and hence halting clinical trials. To support the use of new radionuclides, it is important that they are abundantly available, and in sufficiently high specific activity. Our research focusses on the (pre)clinical development of radionuclides which can be used to design new, patient-specific, radiotracers and therapeutics, using electrochemistry, liquid-liquid or solvent extraction, microfluidics, and ion exchange chromatography. We explore principles based on hot atom chemistry to achieve high specific activity of the produced radionuclides.

We currently investigate a number of different radionuclides, including Ga-68, Mo-99 and Tc-99m, Tb-161, Ho-166, and Ac-225. With our on-site nuclear reactor (the Hoger Onderwijs Reactor of the TU Delft) we are able to make most radionuclides following (n,y) and (n.p) reactions. Separation and recovery is performed based on e.g. ion exchange chromatography, electrochemistry, as well as liquid-liquid or solvent extraction using microfluidics. If you're interested in working with a specific radionuclide or radiotracer, please get in touch, we are always happy to collaborate!

Isotope production

Our research on radionuclide production and separation can broadly be divided in the following topics. Please click on the topic of your interest for further information.

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For the complete list of our publications, click here 

Liquid-liquid extraction is a very effective way to separate radioactive isotopes intended for medical applications, but up to now it is not commonly used. The big drawback of these extraction systems is the large size of the installation, determined, as a rule, by the extractor size; need for using heavy protection in operation, high skill required of the staff and lack of convenient automated systems. All of these make it not applicable for the daily use in hospitals. This is why we are working on the development of microfluidic devices for radionuclide separation, which would take away these drawbacks by miniaturising the extraction system and making them easy to automate. Our final goal will be an automated system for the purification of medically applied isotopes.

 

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Nanomaterials for radionuclide generators

Tc-99m is one of the most often used radionuclides in nuclear medicine, good for about 20 million procedures worldwide annually. At the hospital, it is eluted from a radionuclide generator, based on the decay of the mother isotope Mo-99. This Mo-99 is currently produced from the fission of U-235 in reactors worldwide, resulting in quite some radioactive waste. We work on a new method of producing Mo-99, using the direct production route with Mo-98 as target material. We aim for a dual functionality nanomaterial-based Mo-target, to be used both as target as well as generator material, which can be recycled back to the irradiation facility after use in the hospital. 

 

Publications:

RID ontwikkelt recyclebare technetium generator,

Kernvisie, 2022, pg 16-17

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Chelator-impregnated resins

Although chelator-impregnated resins are known for their very high selectivity towards the product radionuclides, issues with their chemical stability have thusfar severely limited their use in the separation of (medical) radionuclides from their respective irradiated targets. We are developing a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)-based chelator-impregnated resin, which has shown a high chemical stability against leaching. Initial studies with the the separation of the radionuclides Y-90, La-140, and Ac-225 from their respective targets with D2EHPA-impregnated beads achieved high extraction efficiencies (>90%) in very small volumes, highlighting the potential of chelator-impregnated resins in the rapidly growing field of (medical) radionuclide production.

Continuous radionuclide production using liquid targets

Faster, on-demand accessible radionuclides would rapidly speed up radiopharmaceutical developments. This is why we are investigating the potential of a liquid target irradiation system, with an on-line extraction system of the produced radionuclides, allowing for rapid extraction of produced radionuclides and enabling the recycling of the target nuclides.

© 2021 by Robin de Kruijff

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