With an eye toward increasing the worldwide supply of molybdenum (Mo-99), NorthStar Medical Radioisotopes and nuclear energy firm Westinghouse Electric have inked a memorandum of understanding to explore the potential of producing medical radioisotopes in commercial nuclear reactors.
The firms said they are particularly interested in generating Mo-99 by irradiating molybdenum-98 (Mo-98) in a commercial nuclear reactor core. Westinghouse currently has a patent pending for the production of medical radioisotopes using a movable in-core detector system that is part of existing Westinghouse plant design. Meanwhile, NorthStar has been developing two processes for using stable isotopes of molybdenum such as Mo-98 and Mo-100 -- rather than highly enriched uranium -- as the starting point for Mo-99 production.
Mo-99 is the parent isotope of technetium-99m (Tc-99m).
