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A new face of nuclear medicine

A new face of nuclear medicine Heart Institute makes own medical isotopes By Tom Spears, The Ottawa Citizen J uly 7, 2009 “…………………In the institute’s basement, there’s a machine with a name like a carnival ride — the cyclotron — that produces medical isotopes (radioactive atoms) without a nuclear reactor.

To anyone who has toured a nuclear reactor building, the contrast is startling. Reactors are huge machines in earthquake-proof buildings running 24 hours a day, surrounded by layer upon layer of security and shutdown systems, and with radioactive waste that will last for millennia.

They cost hundreds of millions of dollars to build (even the smallest ones), and the last pair built in Canada flunked their safety tests last year and therefore have never operated.

The cyclotron at the Heart Institute is a big metal box in a room that measures about eight by 10 metres. You can walk right up to it safely while it’s running.

At night, the staff just turn it off and go home.

This is a new face of nuclear medicine, making medical isotopes that will make pictures of the heart, brain, bones and so on.

De Kemp continues his explanation of the glowing blobs on a compu

A new face of nuclear medicine

July 7, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Canada, environment | antinuclear, nuclear, radiation, radioactive