The European Medical Radionuclide Program aims to fundamentally change the pattern of new and emerging medical radionuclides in Europe.
Nuclear medicine and molecular imaging are widely used in hospitals for new promising medical procedures. They can greatly improve the outcome of many medical conditions, especially for the treatment of disseminated cancer. However, its effective development has long been limited by the difficulty of obtaining the uncommercialized radionuclide . With PRISMAP (European Medical Radionuclide Program), this situation is about to change. The Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, which is part of PRISMAP, is one of the providers of radionuclides.
In nuclear medicine, radioactive substances are introduced into the patient's body and find a way to a specific biological target in the body. Depending on the radioactive properties of the radionuclide, it may emit radiation that can be detected with an external detector to visualize the distribution of related nuclide (SPECT, PET imaging); or it may emit charged particles, such as α -Or β-particles, these particles store their energy locally (micrometers to a few millimeters, that is, from cell size to metastasis size), thereby only destroying the localized area. For example, targeted radionuclide therapy (TRNT) is used to treat cancer .
Of the more than 3000 different radionuclides synthesized by scientists in the laboratory, only a few are frequently used in medical procedures, mainly for imaging, although interest in TRNT has been growing in the past few years. One of the main limitations for the development of new radiomedical products is the acquisition of radionuclides during the development and early biomedical research stages. In the PRISMAP-European Medical Radionuclide Program, this development stage can be achieved by allowing medical researchers to obtain high-purity new radionuclides.
The production of radionuclides The radioactive elements used in nuclear medicine are not naturally available and must be synthesized in the laboratory. There are two main approaches: neutron irradiation in nuclear research reactors and alpha irradiation from protons, deuterons, or particle accelerators.The size and energy of the particle accelerator determine which radionuclide can be produced: Many hospitals have small, compact machines that can obtain the radionuclides used today. However, higher energy machines are needed to produce new types of radionuclides that are currently unavailable.
Purification of radionuclides In the production of these new types of radionuclides, new challenges have emerged: First, the co-production of harmful radioactivity, which will affect the quality of medicines, may have an adverse effect on patients, and may have an impact on the hospital environment. The waste management caused serious difficulties. In order to solve this problem, new purification techniques are needed. In PRISMAP, technologies based on physical mass separation and radiochemistry will be developed to realize the production of high-purity radionuclides suitable for medical products.
Access and Translational Research To support ongoing research throughout Europe and beyond, PRISMAP will provide immediate access to new radionuclides. A single access platform was established through their website, where production and support capabilities were demonstrated.
has established a world-leading network of European facilities, including nuclear reactors, medium and high energy accelerators, and radiochemical laboratories, providing the most extensive radionuclide catalog for medical research. The CERN MEDICIS facility can perform mass separation to provide physical separation of element isotopes. This is done by a biomedicine research facility network, which can receive external researchers when radionuclides are not suitable for long-term transport to their institutions, or when European permits for new types of radionuclides have not yet been obtained Research is conducted near production facilities.
will apply for the use of radionuclides through the PRISMAP online access platform, and if necessary, apply for the use of supplementary biomedical facilities, so as to grant the right to use radionuclides and related facilities on the basis of excellent choices. A selection panel composed of experts in the fields of radionuclide production, molecular imaging and radionuclide therapy will select the best project from the applicants. The first request for proposals will be launched before the end of 2021, and the application period will be in the first quarter of 2022. It will be open to any interested parties.
In the rapidly developing field of nuclear medicine, PRISMAP also looks at the future. The European Commission has pledged to pass the European Fight Against Cancer Plan,Especially the SAMIRA action plan announced earlier this year, including the establishment of the European Radioisotope Valley Initiative, to address the social impact of cancer. Through the PRISMAP consortium composed of 23 academic and research institutions in Europe, the development of these new radionuclides production scale will be studied in the form of new production technologies, new purification methods and proof-of-concept investigations, from test benches to new patient care. Therapies directly support this European-wide program.
As a consortium serving the community of start-up researchers, PRISMAP hopes to become a more mature community and welcomes new facilities to expand the capacity of the program. New facilities are coming soon, such as the Jules Horowitz reactor of CEA Cadarache (France), the ISOL(at) MYRRHA mass separator facility of SCK CEN (Belgium), the new SPES accelerator complex of the Legnaro National Laboratory (Italy) of INFN, Lund ( Sweden) European spallation sources, and finally the new SPIRAL2 facility in GANIL (France) (which recently accelerated its first batch of beams) and the FAIR facility in GSI (Germany), whose construction is in progress. These new facilities will directly benefit from PRISMAP's research results to increase production capacity throughout Europe.
Through cooperation between research hospitals and metrology institutions, new data will be generated and compiled for the immediate and smooth adoption of new radionuclides in the medical environment. All new discoveries will be used to create new teaching materials for professionals in various fields in this multidisciplinary field, as well as to train the next generation of professionals and provide advice to the European Commission on these emerging radionuclides.
Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) is one of the main partners of the PRISMAP alliance. Researchers are using its large research facility SINQ (Swiss Spallation Neutron Source) and injector 2 and IP2 radiation station to produce radionuclides for medical purposes. Radionuclides bind to molecular complexes, selectively dock with tumor cells in the body, and can destroy them with their particle radiation. The Radiopharmaceutical Science Center is one of the few research institutions in Switzerland that can develop the radiopharmaceutical .It can be used not only for research purposes, but also for clinical trials. Currently, the registration process for clinical trials using the promising therapeutic radionuclide terbium-161 is underway. In addition,
nuclear medicine research is a truly multidisciplinary approach. To move forward, it requires physicists, engineers, radiochemists, inorganic chemists, structural biologists, clinicians, medical physicists, Bridge between dosimetry, pharmacologist and oncologist. PRISMAP-The European Medical Radionuclide Program will definitely support the implementation of the multidisciplinary work concept in practice.
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