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Advances in emerging field of ‘theranostics’ are a game-changer Millions of patients around the globe rely on the regular and timely production of diagnostic and therapeutic isotopes produced in research reactors and accelerator facilities. Image courtesy IAEA. Advances in medical isotope diagnostics and therapy are holding promise for cancer patients, despite challenges facing the nuclear medical field in recent years related to radionuclide production and supply, rising costs, and stricter regulation.

Medical isotopes are radioactive substances used in various diagnostic and therapeutic procedures to treat various types of cancers and other conditions. They are essential for modern medicine, allowing physicians to visualise and target specific organs, tissues and cells in a patient’s body.

Over more than a decade, personalised medicine using nuclear techniques has been gaining pace, allowing doctors to tailor therapies and treatments to the specific needs and physiology of a patient, and to avoid harm to healthy organs or tissues.

According to Sven Van den Berghe, chief executive of Belgium-based isotope producer PanTera, one technique that has seen significant advances is known as theranostics – the term used to describe the combination of using one radioactive drug to diagnose and a second to deliver therapy to treat the main tumour and any metastatic tumours.

Date: Friday, 14 April 2023
Original article: nucnet.org/news/sector-aims-to-tackle-isotope-supply-problems-as-excitement-grows-over-targeted-therapies-4-4-2023

The installation of the pumps for the primary cooling circuit of Argentina's RA-10 multipurpose reactor has been completed, the country's National Atomic Energy Commission (CNEA) has announced. This marks completion of the assembly of the reactor's large components.

Date: Saturday, 10 October 2020
Original article: world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Large-components-in-place-for-Argentinean-research

Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) announced on 2 April that isotope production reactor the National Research Universal (NRU) at the Chalk River site had been permanently shut down. It will now be placed into a "state of storage" prior to decommissioning. The reactor, which produced about 40% of world supply of molybdenum-99 (Mo-99), ceased production in October 2016, since when it has remained on standby "in case of a significant shortage which could not be mitigated by other means". Research reactors in Australia, Europe, Russia and South Africa have since met demand.

Date: Friday, 06 April 2018
Original article: neimagazine.com/news/newscanada-permanently-closes-nru-research-reactor-6107149