Tandem Van de Graaff accelerator production of positron labeled radiopharmaceuticals for routine clinical use.

This paper describes a facility to produce positron labeled radiopharmaceuticals with a tandem Van de Graaff accelerator. 11C labeled carbon monoxide (11CO), 15O labeled H2O (H2 15O) and 18F labeled 2-deoxy-2-fluoro-D-glucose ([18F]2FDG), were chosen so that physiological measurements of cerebral blood volume, cerebral blood flow, and the cerebral metabolic rate for glucose could be made routinely in our PET center. This facility uses a tandem Van de Graaff accelerator which is relatively remote from the clinical area. Measurements of radionuclide yield and beam penetration showed that it was feasible to deliver sufficient amounts of radioactivity for the measurements. Both 11CO and H2 15O presented significant delivery problems due to their shorter half-lives. For H2 15O a continuous delivery system for water vapour and an infusion system for the administration of H2 15O in saline were designed and constructed. 11CO and [18F]2FDG were hand carried. This facility has demonstrated that a tandem Van de Graaff accelerator can routinely supply a PET center with adequate quantities of these three radiopharmaceuticals.