Elisabeth Eppard

By Elisabeth Eppard

In recent years, the positron emitter scandium-44 moved into the focus of research providing favorable nuclide properties for an application in nuclear medicine. Radiolabeling of PSMA-617 with scandium-44 as diagnostic match for [177Lu]Lu-PSMA-617 instead of gallium-68 would enable pre-therapeutic dosimetry in clinical setting. Due to the chemical similarities of scandium and lutetium, the in vitro and in vivo characteristics of [177Lu]Lu-PSMA-617 are more similar to [44Sc]Sc-PSMA-617 than to the 68Ga-compounds [68Ga]Ga-PSMA-617 or [68Ga]Ga-PSMA-11. [44Sc]Sc-PSMA-617 showed its potential in a clinical setting as a PET imaging agent of prostate cancer providing several advantages over gallium-68 labeled tracers. The longer half-life of the nuclide would allow, for example, an optimized patient management and treatment, long-term or late time point imaging as well as transportation to more distant PET centers. However, especially clinical applications like individual dosimetry or intraoperative applications are still under investigation.

Part of the book: Prostatectomy

By Michael Meisenheimer, Yury Saenko and Elisabeth Eppard

Gallium-68 was applied for positron emission tomography (PET) imaging already in the early beginnings of PET imaging. Today, with the introduction of PSMA-targeting tracers (e.g. PSMA-11, PSMA-617, and PSMA-I&T), the number of clinical applications of 68Ga-radiopharmaceuticals for diagnostic imaging has grown considerably. This development was initiated and supported already in the mid-2000s by the commercial availability of 68Ge/68Ga generators designed for clinical usage. This progression was accompanied by the development of several purification methods to generator eluate as well as sophisticated 68Ga-radiopharmaceuticals. Due to the 68Ga-rush, the need for implementation of gallium-68 (depending on production route) and its certain tracers into the pharmacopeia increased. Based on the specifications given by the pharmacopeia, interest focused on the development of automated synthesis systems, 99mTc-analog kits with regard to patient as well as operator safety.

Part of the book: Medical Isotopes

By Otolorin Adelaja Osibote and Elisabeth Eppard

Part of the book: Advances in Dosimetry and New Trends in Radiopharmaceuticals

By Nasim Vahidfar, Mohsen Bakhshi Kashi, Saeed Afshar, Peyman Sheikhzadeh, Saeed Farzanefar, Yalda Salehi, Ebrahim Delpasand, Eóin N. Molloy, Siroos Mirzaei, Hojjat Ahmadzadehfar and Elisabeth Eppard

Copper radioisotopes including copper-60/61/62, and -64 exhibit a wide range of decay characteristics, making them appropriate choices for diagnostic/therapeutic (theranostic) applications in nuclear medicine. One notable feature of copper is the feasible coordination chemistry, which makes radiolabeling of a wide range of chemical structures including antibodies, proteins, peptides, and other biologically relevant small molecules possible. This chapter will summarize common radiopharmaceuticals of copper-64 and their radiation dosimetry in order to highlight recent improvements of positron emission tomography diagnostics.

Part of the book: Advances in Dosimetry and New Trends in Radiopharmaceuticals