A purification system for (64)Cu produced by a biomedical cyclotron for antibody PET imaging

Ion exchange is a simple and efficient method for separating no-carrier-added (64)Cu from an irradiated Ni target. We developed a semi-automated two-round (64)Cu separation system equipped with a strong-base anion exchange resin column. We first verified the efficiency of the system using a non-radioactive substitute consisting of 25 mg of Ni and 127 ng of Cu, and confirmed that Cu was completely eluted at the second round of the separation step. After the bombardment, separation of (64)Cu from the Ni target was achieved with high radiochemical purity. (64)Cu produced and separated in this study had an extremely low level of Ni impurity. It could be used for labeling monoclonal antibodies for antibody positron emission tomography imaging and synthesizing radiopharmaceuticals.