Development of an Automated Synthesizer for the Routine Production of Ga-68 Radiopharmaceuticals

Abstract

The germanium-68/gallium-68 (68Ge/68Ga) generator has high spatial utilization and requires little maintenance, making it economical and easy to produce. Thus, the frequency of use of 68Ga radiopharmaceuticals is rapidly increasing worldwide. Therefore, this study attempted to develop an automated synthesizer for the routine clinical application of 68Ga radiopharmaceuticals. The automated synthesizer was based on a fixed tubing system and the structure was designed after adjusting the position of the parts to reflect the synthesis method. Using various components that can be supplied in Korea, the automated synthesizer was manufactured at a much lower price cost than that of a commercialized automated synthesizer sold by companies. 68Ga-DOTA-[Tyr3]-octreotide (68Ga-DOTATOC) was synthesized to evaluate the performance of the automated synthesizer. 68Ga-DOTATOC could be synthesized with about 65% of non-decay corrected yield, and the synthesized 68Ga-DOTATOC met all quality control standards. We have synthesized 68Ga-DOTATOC more than 100 times, and only faced a few problems caused by mechanical errors. In this study, we successfully developed a simple automated synthesizer for 68Ga radiopharmaceuticals with high reproducibility. As various 68Ga radiopharmaceuticals have recently been developed, it is expected that the automated synthesizer developed in this study will be useful for routine clinical use.

Keywords

• automated synthesizer
• 68ga-dotatoc
• gallium-68
• quality control
• radiopharmaceuticals