Exploiting Channeling of Charged Particles for the Enhancement of the Ni64->Cu64 Reaction Yield

Objectives The production techniques of radioisotopes for medical purposes is a valuable and important field in nuclear medicine. In particular, the expensive cost of the prime materials for the production via cyclotron obliges the search for new solutions to enhance the production rate with minor upgrades of the current instrumentations.

Methods Oriented ordered structure can modify particle trajectories inside a medium leading to a sensible variation of the interaction rate with atomic nuclei [1]. Under particular orientation of the target with respect t the incident beam (the anti-channeling condition), the probability of inelastic interaction with nuclei can be enhanced up to two times with respect to the standard rate, leading to the increasing of the radioisotope production yield.

Results The usage of a extensively tested Monte Carlo simulation tool allowed to demonstrate the possibility to exploit a crystalline Ni64 target in order to observe the predicted enhancement. The experimental conditions of the interaction of a 16.5 MeV/c proton beam with the target in the nozzle of an available commercial cyclotron were reproduced by means of the Geant4 tool-kit [2]. The map of the Cu64 production yield as a function of the alignment of the beam with the crystalline target was simulated and the needed parameters to run the experiment are summarized.

Conclusions The exploitation of channeling of charged particles is a viable way to enhance the production yield of radioisotopes. The the expected gain was estimated and the experimental condition defined.