This article examines the production of metastable technetium-99 (Tc-99m), the world’s most important radiopharmaceutical, focusing on reliability of supply and risks of nuclear terrorism. Only four producers manufactured about 95 percent of the world’s Tc-99m; a closure of any of them could cause worldwide shortfalls. Moreover, all four employ highly enriched uranium in their production proces...

In the first part of this two-part article, the characteristics, potential uses, radiochemical purity and method of evaluating the activity of Tc99m will be discussed. In the second part of the article, the dosimetry of this radionuclide will be presented for various routes of administration as well as for various chem ical configurations, such as the pertechnetate ion, the colloid and the prot...

(99m)Tc is the standard radionuclide used for nuclear medicine imaging. In addition to gamma irradiation, (99m)Tc emits low-energy Auger and conversion electrons that deposit their energy within nanometers of the decay site. To study the potential for DNA damage, direct DNA binding is required. Plasmid DNA enables the investigation of the unprotected interactions between molecules and DNA that ...

Clinical or subclinical hyperparathyroidism is one of the most common endocrine disorders. Excessive secretion of parathyroid hormone is most frequently caused by an adenoma of >or=1 parathyroid gland. Unsuccessful surgery with persistent hyperparathyroidism, due to inadequate preoperative or intraoperative localization, may be observed in about 10% of patients. The conventional surgical approa...

WANG, Y.F., CHUANG, M.H., CHIU, J.S., CHAM, T.M. and CHUNG, M.I. On-Site Preparation of Technetium-99m Labeled Human Serum Albumin for Clinical Application. Tohoku J. Exp. Med., 2007, 211 (4), 379-385 ── Technetium-99m labeled human serum albumin (Tc-99m HSA) is an important radiopharmaceutical for clinical applications, such as cardiac function tests or protein-losing gastroenteropathy assessm...

UNLABELLED (99m)Tc is currently produced by an aging fleet of nuclear reactors, which require enriched uranium and generate nuclear waste. We report the development of a comprehensive solution to produce (99m)Tc in sufficient quantities to supply a large urban area using a single medical cyclotron. METHODS A new target system was designed for (99m)Tc production. Target plates made of tantalum...

Radionuclide Tc99m DTPA (Diethylenetriaminepenta Acetic Acid) renal imaging is being used to assist in the evaluation of overall GFR, the intra-renal transit time, the cortical transit time, response to frusimide injection, diagnosis of ATN and rejection in renal transplant cases. A study was conducted at PINSTECH in order to prepare DTPA kit locally and evaluate the labeling efficiency as well...

BACKGROUND Macrophages represent a critical cell type in host defense, development and homeostasis. The ability to image non-invasively pro-inflammatory macrophage infiltrate into a transplanted organ may provide an additional tool for the monitoring of the immune response of the recipient against the donor graft. We therefore decided to image in vivo sialoadhesin (Sn, Siglec 1 or CD169) using ...

Key words: hyperparathyroidism-radionuclide-imaging; primary and secondary hyperparathyroidism [1–3]. With hyperplastic parathyroid glands tetrofosmin hyperplasia; Technetium-99m-diagnostic use; tetrofosmin imaging gives an overall sensitivity of 84% and a specificity of 75%, higher than those of Tc-99m sestam-ibi, ultrasonography and magnetic resonance imaging Renal history [1–2]. The former h...