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Radiostrontium separation from sodium molybdate solution and its measurement using LSA: an application to radiopharmaceutical analysis

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Abstract

Technetium (99mTc), a decay product of molybdenum (99Mo), is employed as radioisotope in nuclear medicine. Several practical devices known as generators are commercially available which enable the user to separate the daughter from the parent radionuclide. The present study is focused on quality control of chromatographic technetium generator. A properly constructed generator should comply with international requirements of radionuclide purity of 90Sr/99Mo ≤ 6 × 10−8 and 89Sr/99Mo ≤ 6 × 10−7. For this purpose an analytical method was optimized to quantify radiostrontium (89Sr and 90Sr) in sodium molybdate [Na 992 MoO4] solution, a fission product used for 99Mo/99mTc generators. Dowex 1 × 8 and alumina were used in sequence followed by tributyl phosphate extraction for radiostrontium separation. Cerenkov measurement of 89Sr and 90Sr (through its descendent 90Y) was performed using Perkin Elmer Tricarb LSA 3170 with detection efficiency of 42 and 14 %, respectively. Since efficiency of Cerenkov counting is sensitive to presence of color, spectral index of sample was used to correct the counting efficiency. The chemical recovery for strontium was 22 % and for yttrium was 80 % as determined by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry. Lower limit of detection was found to be 6.3 and 14.4 Bq L−1 for 90Sr and 89Sr, respectively with 60 min counting time. Hence method can be applied successfully to analyze 89,90Sr in fission molybdenum used as radiopharmaceutical with a relative error of <10 %.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Dr. Javed Iqbal Akhtar DG, PINSTECH; Dr. Matiullah, Director System and Services; Eng. Nisar Ahmad, Director Technology; Dr. Bashir Muhammad, CAFD and whole team of Molybdenum Production Facility (MPF) for their cooperation and financial support. We are also thankful to Mr. Farooq Jan (PS), HPD for technical discussion.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environmental Monitoring Group, Health Physics Division, PINSTECH, P. O. Nilore, Islamabad, Pakistan

    Mumtaz Khan, T. Jabbar, M. I. Anjum, M. Dilband, K. Khan, A. Jabbar & W. Arshed

  2. Molybdenum Production Facility, Isotope Production Division, PINSTECH, P. O. Nilore, Islamabad, Pakistan

    M. Asif

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  1. Mumtaz Khan
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  2. T. Jabbar
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  3. M. Asif
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  4. M. I. Anjum
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Correspondence to Mumtaz Khan.

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Khan, M., Jabbar, T., Asif, M. et al. Radiostrontium separation from sodium molybdate solution and its measurement using LSA: an application to radiopharmaceutical analysis. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 299, 577–582 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-013-2841-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-013-2841-z

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