Installation of the new particle accelerator, a P70 cyclotron, in the INFN national Laboratories in Legnaro has just been completed. The exotic nuclei that will be produced by the accelerator will be used to create radiopharmaceuticals for use in medicine and, at the same time, their study will allow us to investigate the processes that lead to the formation of heavy nuclei, such as those that are synthesized in the explosion of supernovae, thus expanding the knowledge of our universe. “The cyclotron at the Laboratories in Legnaro – explains Giovanni Fiorentini, Laboratory Director – is a machine in which every second ten million billion protons are accelerated up to seventy million volts, and constitutes the first part of SPES, a project that will be used to treat people and study the universe”, concludes Fiorentini. The accelerator was built by the Canadian company BEST, in close collaboration with INFN, and the same company has also expressed interest in the marketing radioisotopes produced at the Laboratories in Legnaro. The new machine, in fact, will allow radioisotopes, such as Strontium 82, of exceptional interest for nuclear medicine and available only in a few centres worldwide, to be produced in quantity. This production will also open the way to research on innovative radiopharmaceuticals, in collaboration with the most important national and international centres
14 May 2015
