Nuclear reaction cross section database for production of therapeutic radioisotopes

Cancer treatment is a major medical issue requiring early prognosis and further development of therapeutic approaches, particularly new developments in radiation therapy (external beam or sealed/unsealed internal sources). There is a wide range of radioisotopes in use or being proposed for internal (brachytherapy, radioimmunotherapy, metabolic therapy, etc.) therapeutic applications. Accurate knowledge of production and decay data are essential for application and optimization of the production. International effort in the frame of an IAEA -Coordinated Research Project (CRP) are presently underway for development of a standard database for production of therapeutic radionuclides. The project can be considered as a continuation of the previous CRP which concentrated on the production of medically related diagnostic radioisotopes and charged particle beam monitor reactions. The project focuses on the production of the most important established and emerging radioisotopes (and the associated critical impurities). The list of reactions includes nearly fifty important neutron[(n, f), (n, γ), (n, p)] and charged particle [(p, n), (p, 2n), (p, 3n), (p, 2p), (d, n), (d, 2n), (d, x),(α, 2n)] induced reactions. The program of work consists of new measurements, compilation, critical selection and fitting of the reported experimental data, nuclear model calculations, and validation of the recommended data. The database will be available in a user-friendly form on web and will be published as an IAEA TECDOC. The status of the program will be reviewed.