A St. Albert scientist has snagged a $3-million grant to build a better proton cannon — one that could make isotopes needed to find cancer.
The federal government said last week that it would give the University of Alberta $3 million to research new ways of making medical isotopes. These radioactive substances are often used to detect cancer or heart disease.
This money will help build a powerful cyclotron, said Doug Abrams, director of the Edmonton Radiopharmaceutical Centre at the Cross Cancer Institute and St. Albert resident, one he hopes will help solve a worldwide shortage of technetium-99, a medical isotope used in many procedures.
Abrams said he was very excited to learn of the grant. Most technetium now comes from 50-year-old reactors, he said, many of which are breaking down. His research suggests that cyclotrons could produce the same stuff for less money.
"We've shown proof of principle using smaller cyclotrons that we can indeed make technetium. Now, if we have a bigger one, we can take advantage of the higher power and make enough to be clinically useful."
Big blue blaster
Technetium-99 is a radioactive isotope used in about 200,000 medical procedures a year in Alberta, explained Sandy McEwan, chair of cancer treatment (oncology) at the University of Alberta and a member of the cyclotron team. About 85 per cent of Canada's isotope tests use technetium, according to the university.
Most technetium comes from spent nuclear fuel, Abrams said, which can only be produced at special reactors. Since there aren't many of those reactors, they tend to cause global shortages when they break down. Ontario's Chalk River reactor caused such a shortage when it shut down for repairs last year.
Reactors make technetium-99 through nuclear fission, Abrams said: neutrons smack into uranium causing it to explode into a bunch of elements, one of which (molybdenum-99) turns into technetium. Scientists think they can use a cyclotron in a similar fashion.
"A cyclotron is essentially an accelerator," he explained. The one at the Cross Cancer Institute looks like a big blue electrical transformer covered with wires and copper pipes, and uses magnets to make protons move at close to the speed of light. Scientists believe they can use a bigger cyclotron to blast protons at a film of molybdenum, which should transform it into technetium-99.
One cyclotron could easily meet the isotope needs for the whole Edmonton region, Abrams said, adding a network of them could meet about 80 per cent of national demand. They would also be cheap: cyclotrons cost about $3.5 million, while reactors cost about a billion.
"For a relatively small amount of money you could locate these all around Canada," he said, creating a much more reliable supply of isotopes.
Abrams and company are now looking for a home for their new cyclotron, McEwan said, and hope to start operations in about nine months. Medical isotopes could be available in as little as four years.
