The State Atomic Energy Corporation ROSATOM (Russia) and Kinetics Corporation Ltd (Thailand) will supply a cyclotron complex with radiochemical laboratories for the Thailand Institute of Nuclear Technology (TINT).

The facility will be located at the Ongkharak Nuclear Research Centre in Nakhon Nayok. With an area of more than 5,400 square metres, the new complex will accommodate a cyclotron and several laboratories for the production of radiopharmaceuticals for nuclear medicine and other purposes.  It will also serve as a platform for research and development activities in the field of radiation technologies. The project is expected to be implemented within three years and six months.  “Currently all the isotopes for SPECT [single photon emission computed tomography] in Thailand are imported, with some PET [positron emission tomographyisotopes] produced in hospitals locally in amounts that cannot satisfy the demand. Thus, the new cyclotron supplied by our Russian partners will allow Thailand to produce its own isotopes to save lives and boost innovations in our country”, said Dr Somchai Uapipatanakul, managing director of Kinetics Corporation whose offer based on ROSATOM’s technologies won the contract with TINI.

The project will also drive the research and development activities in nuclear medicine, as well as in application of nuclear technologies in the different areas of industry, Somchai said. The core of the complex will be an MCC-30/15 cyclotron of 30 MeV proton energy, which will be used to produce isotopes for PET and SPECT diagnostics. These isotopes allow determining the stage of oncological, cardiac and neurological diseases accurately.

“We are grateful to our Thai partners and the customer for the trust in the Russian nuclear technologies. ROSATOM has more than 70 years of expertise in innovations, including designing and manufacturing nuclear medicine solutions, with 14 radionuclide production facilities operating in Russia,” said Egor Simonov, head of Singapore-based ROSATOM Southeast Asia.

Source:
courtesy of XINHUA NEWS AGENCY

by The Nation

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