Gunnar Antoni

Progress in 11C Radiochemistry

With this contribution focusing on developments in labeling chemistry using 11C- as the radionuclide, we hope that this might inspire further development of using of short-lived β+-emitting tracers, especially 11C in medicine. There is no doubt that from the synthetic perspective the potential of 11C as a radionuclide in future tracer development, even for clinical applications, is outstanding. However, there are still severe problems which need to be addressed, and these include developing technology so that the tracer production can be improved to such an extent that the existing infrastructure and technicians will be capable of operating with the sophistication of the chemistry which is needed. As this field of imaging science is in an early phase of its development, there is still a strong need for continuing investigations on the scope and limitation of new synthetic methods, technology and its integration in applications in biological systems.

ASPECTS ON THE SYNTHESIS AND DESIGN OF 11C-TRACERS FOR PET

The design of tracers labelled with short-lived positron emitting radionuclides, for non-invasive use in combination with positron emission tomography (PET), is an important factor when considering the fate of the tracer in vivo. PET is a technique with a possibility of measuring events in complex systems with many parameters, which might effect the outcome of the process studied. Simplified models have to be used to describe the system. The design aspects of the radiotracer with respect to which radionuclide to choose, what position to label, which stereochemical form to use or combining multiple isotopic labelling are becoming more and more important because it can be used to test models with regard to essential physiological parameters such as flow, transport, binding, metabolism etc.