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Preparation of 227Ac/223Ra by neutron irradiation of 226Ra

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Abstract

Radium-223 is a prospective alpha-emitter for targeted radionuclide therapy. Although 223Ra is formed naturally by the decay of 235U, for practical reasons its preparation involves neutron irradiation of 226Ra. The β decay of the 227Ra (T ½ = 43 min) produced via 226Ra(n,γ)227Ra reaction leads to 227Ac, a mother nuclide of 227Th and subsequently 223Ra. Radium target material is generally available in multigram quantities from historical stock. The main aim of this study was to experimentally as well as theoretically evaluate and verify the available literature data on production of 227Ac/223Ra. According to the data obtained from the γ-spectra, the approximate yield values were determined and effective cross section value for the 227Ac production was calculated to 14 ± 4 b.

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Acknowledgments

This work was partially supported by the Ministry of Education Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic and the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic under grant agreements No.: LK21310 and TA03010027 respectively.

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Correspondence to Ján Kozempel.

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Kukleva, E., Kozempel, J., Vlk, M. et al. Preparation of 227Ac/223Ra by neutron irradiation of 226Ra. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 304, 263–266 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-014-3432-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-014-3432-3

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