IJSRST162548 | Received: 01 Oct 2016 | Accepted: 16 Nov 2016 | November-December-2016 [(2)5: 106-111]
© 2016 IJSRST | Volume 2 | Issue 6 | Print ISSN: 2395-6011 | Online ISSN: 2395-602X
Themed Section: Science and Technology
106
Direct Production of Radioiodine-123 from Tellurium with
Lowest Level of Iodine Impurity-124
Iman Tarik AL-Alawy*
1
, Raghad S. Mohammed
2
*1,2
Department of Physics, Al-Mustansiriyah University/College of Science, Baghdad, Iraq
drimantarik@yahoo.com
1
raghad_almaliki@yahoo.com
2
ABSTRACT
Radioiodine is one of the most important radioisotopes uses in the therapeutic and diagnosis of some diseases. The
radioactivity emitting from the radioactive isotopes such as Auger electrons, positrons and gamma rays play an
important role in medical applications. The half-life of radioactive nuclei I-123 with 13.2h is appropriate for
treatment and diagnostic. The main production routes can be obtained using Te
52
target. Excitations functions of
and reactions for the production of I-123 and I-124 have been evaluated using experimental data of
incident protons, energy and cross sections, published by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),
especially (EXFOR) library. These data are for different authors and several years prior to the present. The best
reaction for the production of Iodine-123 is ) , (
71
123
52
n p Te reaction, while the best reaction for the production of
Iodine-124 is ) , (
72
124
52
n p Te . The analysis of a complete energy range has been done for each reaction. The cross
sections are reproduced in fine steps of incident proton in 0.01MeV intervals with their corresponding error.
Impurity levels that appear in the production processes, which have the highest medical applications, have been
estimated. The best useful energy range has been chosen by using cyclotron to reduce the appearance of nuclear
impurities.
Keywords: Radioisotope, I–123, I–124, Cross Section, Iodine Production, Impurity
I. INTRODUCTION
Radionuclides have the same chemical properties. Their
existence is measured in half-lives of their isotopes.
Nuclear reactions provide different therapeutic
radioisotopes. Radioisotopes which emit gamma rays in
coincidences formed in the annihilation of a positron are
used in disease treatment, especially cancer, treating aids
and other diseases. Therapeutic radioisotopes are also
used for medical diagnostics of many organs functioning
[1].
Two imaging techniques involve the detection to give
information about the organs and tissues are the Positron
Emission Tomography (PET) which is a very good field
for clinical diagnosis. A positron emission tomography
(PET) imaging scan is a radioactive trace to detect the
organs and tissues functions in 3-D pictures [2]. The
second technique is the Single Photon Emission
Computed Tomography (SPECT). It is subsequently
processes them into 3-D images representing the
distribution of nuclear activity and enables the physician
to view the activity distribution in cross sections of the
human body [3].
Iodine-123 isotope is typically suitable for (SPECT)
imaging since it has a half-life of few hours that the
radiation exposure of the patient is not too high, and
now I-124 isotope is used for (PET) imaging [3,4]. One
of the most promising uses of I-123 is in the imaging of
monoclinical antibodies to localize and visualize
tumours [5]. It is also used as nuclear imaging tracers to
evaluate the anatomic and physiologic function of the
thyroid [6]. It gives a much lower radiation dose to the
patient, and the gamma ray energy of 159keV is ideally
suited for using in a gamma camera. The gamma ray
will penetrate tissue very effectively without an
excessive radiation dose. For this reason, it has in many
instances replaced reactor produced I-131 [5].
Iodine-124 is a proton rich isotope with a half-life of
4.18d. The long lived positron emitter I-124 is long