High-Power Laser Production of PET Isotopes

High Power Lasers and Their New Applications

“…Positron emission tomography (PET) is a powerful medical diagnostic and imaging technique to detect cancer tissues in the human body [47]. The PET process involves the patient receiving an injection of a pharmaceutical labeled with a short-lived + emitting source which collects in areas of high metabolic activity within the body such as tumors.…”

Deuteron-induced reactions generated by intense lasers for PET isotope production

“…Laser accelerated proton beams have been applied to produce positron emitting isotopes by several groups [1,2,3,4]. Those groups investigate the feasibility of 11 C isotope production rate by the laser-induced reaction 11 B(p, n) 11 C. The reaction has a negative Q-value of -2.765 MeV and, therefore, requires large scale lasers like the VULCAN laser facility at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL).…”

High harmonic generation and ion acceleration with high-intensity laser pulses

“…This is the first limitation of CPA with respect to the final pulse duration. This problem can be compensated for to some extent with advanced techniques such as an acousto-optic programmable dispersive filter (Dazzler) 9 . Other limiting effects on the pulse duration come from the amplification process.…”

“…Examples of such applications are eye surgery via photodisruption (cutting with laser-induced plasmas) [1], laser fusion [2] and remote detection of biological aerosols in the higher atmosphere 2 [3]. High-intensity lasers have also found applications in fundamental research including, but not limited to, materials science, condensed matter physics, chemistry, biology and astronomy [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]. The main source of such developments is the wide range of nonlinear interactions between high-intensity lasers and matter.…”