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Home to TRIUMF’s Life Sciences program, IAMI is equipped with one of the world’s most technologically advanced medical cyclotrons, a TR-24 MeV manufactured by long-time TRIUMF collaborator Advanced Cyclotron Systems Inc. (ACSI). It will also house combined operations for the TR-13 MeV medical cyclotron, operating as part of a precisely choreographed just-in-time delivery system for the supply of medical isotopes to UBC Hospital.
Radiopharmaceuticals are drugs that contain a radioactive isotope (also called medical isotope) that’s used in imaging, diagnosis, and therapy. These are at the core of nuclear medicine, the field of health care that uses these radioisotopes for medical research and imaging.
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The Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) compliant facility will add state-of-the-art laboratory facilities to help grow TRIUMF’s capacity in the area of life sciences, dramatically increasing the ability to advance isotope-based diagnostic, and therapeutic treatments for a range of diseases, including cancer.
TRIUMF researchers have invented ground-breaking small medical cyclotron-based, solid target systems to enable the abundant, cost-effective production of technetium-99m (99mTc). The technology has been commercialized by TRIUMF spin-off company ARTMS, and also been repurposed to produce other important medical isotopes like gallium-68 (68Ga), copper-64 (64Cu), and zirconium-89 (89Zr).
Through IAMI, TRIUMF will continue to advance critical research through its capacity to produce world-leading amounts of Ac-225 – a promising cancer fighting isotope.
Kicked off by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau during his visit to the laboratory in November 2018, IAMI’s construction is supported by contributions from the Province of British Columbia, the Government of Canada, TRIUMF, BC Cancer, BC Cancer Foundation, and UBC.
