Scientists from Moscow State University have found a way to reduce the cost of drugs for nuclear medicine by hundreds of times 14:10

Physicists from Moscow State University have developed a simple and inexpensive method for obtaining nuclear medicine preparations for the treatment of cancer of the bones and internal organs, the cost of which is 2-3 times lower than standard methods. Research results have been published in many foreign and Russian journals: The European Physical Journal A, Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section B: Beam Interactions with Materials and Atoms, Bulletin of the Russian Academy of Sciences: Physics, Physics of Particles and Kernel Letters.

In nuclear medicine, lutetium-177 (177Lu) radionuclide is used to treat bone tumors. With its help, it is possible to carry out local therapy, which minimally affects healthy tissues. This reduces the radiation dose and allows multiple treatment cycles.

To achieve this, the 176Lu isotope is used, which contains less than 3% of natural lutetium and must be enriched up to 82%. Therefore, complex and expensive preliminary procedures are required, and the final product contains chemically inseparable impurities.

Scientists from the Department of Accelerators Physics and Radiation Medicine at the Faculty of Physics of Moscow State University and the Institute of Nuclear Physics of Moscow State University have shown that lutetium-177 can be obtained using nuclear reactions using electron accelerators instead of a reactor. . In this case, not lutetium is used as the isotope source, but other chemical elements: tantalum and hafnium. The change in charge and mass during nuclear reactions makes it possible to obtain lutetium-177 from them.

In this case, the primary cost of irradiation is 2-3 times lower than the production of 177Lu in a reactor. The product is also distinguished by high purity: the content of impurities does not exceed 1%. Electron accelerators are much more compact and less expensive than reactors, so they can be installed in any nuclear medicine center.

“We hope that our research will lead to the mass introduction of advanced methods of nuclear medicine in the Russian Federation and facilitate access to them by people,” said Marina V. Zheltonozhskaya.