Study and development of the activation methodology of iridium-192 in nuclear reactor for cancer treatment

• Grant number: 13/26469-5
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: June 01, 2014
• End date: May 31, 2016
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Nuclear Engineering - Applications of Radioisotopes
• Principal Investigator: Maria Elisa Chuery Martins Rostelato
• Grantee: Maria Elisa Chuery Martins Rostelato
• Host Institution: Instituto de Pesquisas Energéticas e Nucleares (IPEN). Secretaria de Desenvolvimento Econômico (São Paulo - Estado). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Carlos Alberto Zeituni ; Dib Karam Junior

Abstract

Nowadays, in Brazil, there are 64 machines with radioactive sources of iridium-192, in the pellets shape, for use in radiotherapy of High Dose Rate (HDR).These sources are imported carrying high costs for the society. Like the half-life of the iridium-192 is 74 days, these sources need to be changed 3 or 4 times per year. Each source change requires an expert and it costs around R$12.000,00. This source activity is 10 Curies. These sources are used to treat a several kinds of cancer, for example: cervix, breast, lung and others. The local production will diminish the costs of the source change, allowing an increase of the number of machines acquired by the hospitals in the country. The maintenance cost is the major problem for the use of this equipment. The nationalization also diminishes the internal and external transportation risk, storage and handling of the high dose rate radioactive material. By these reasons, IPEN-CNEN/SP intends, in the future, to establish a plant to produce iridium-192 sealed sources for cancer treatment. This project purposes a study of the iridium-192 activation methodology in the IEA-R1 nuclear reactor, because the source needs to be activated around 15 curies. This iridium source should be encapsulated in a stainless steel welded to avoid contamination for the radioactive iridium lixiviation. This activation will create some huge troubles in the future production. First of all, the iridium has a high cross section (around 1000 barns), that difficult the critically maintenance of the reactor. And second, the source activity that goes out of the reactor should be done in a transference device making the operator isolated during the transportation of it to the shielding. This shielding should be studied to make easier, in the laboratory, the transfer of the source to the hot-cell. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

MOURA, EDUARDO S.; MICKA, JOHN A.; HAMMER, CLIFF G.; CULBERSON, WESLEY S.; DEWERD, LARRY A.; ROSTELATO, MARIA ELISA C. M.; ZEITUNI, CARLOS A.. Development of a phantom to validate high-dose-rate brachytherapy treatment planning systems with heterogeneous algorithms. Medical Physics, v. 42, n. 4, p. 1566-1574, APR 2015. (13/26469-5)