Produceren van 225Ac vanuit 226Ra voor toepassingen in de nucleaire geneeskunde

With an aging population, cancer became more common, and today it is one of the leading causes of death. One of the solutions with proven efficacy is the application of 225Ac acting as a targeted alpha therapy radionuclide. Unfortunately, mismatch in supply and demand hinders translation of 225Ac radiopharmaceuticals into clinics, despite ongoing research and investments. To address this lack of supply, alternative approaches towards the production of 225Ac are evaluated in this work, mainly focusing on production from 226Ra but including production from U/Th based targets as an alternative. As for production routes originating from 226Ra material, the whole process from the chemical and physical properties of barium and radium, through target fabrication via electrodeposition, precise target characterization and production process optimization was covered in depth for the first time. The production loop was closed by studying the impact of the stock solution purity on target production and subsequent recycling of the valuable target material.