ד''ר עופר שמני

מייל: [email protected]

Synopsis
The cyclotron and radiochemistry unit at Hadassah operates two cyclotrons, a fully equipped chemistry and radiochemistry laboratory and a microPET/CT imaging facility. Our laboratory routinely produces of variety of positron emission tomography (PET) agents as [18F] FDG, [11C] Choline, [18F] FDOPA, [18F] FLT etc. Our main research activities are in the field of developing (PET) molecular imaging agents and understanding their mechanism of action. I serve as a chemistry and radiochemistry project manager in research aim to develop PET agents for noninvasive probing of non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC). Currently, the only patients with NSCLC who may benefit from tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI's) treatment are those who have a specific activated mutation in the gene encoding for the EGFR. We aim to develop a noninvasive, real time method for detecting those patients before and in the course of treatment with TKI's. Another important project in our laboratory focuses in the developing of myocardial perfusion imaging agents for noninvasive imaging and detection of ischemic coronary artery disease, using [11C] and [18F] labeled various ammonium salts. Our challenge is to introduce fluorine atom to active organic compounds, in organic chemistry techniques. Thereafter, we synthesize those derivatives while using [18F] produced in the cyclotron in automated synthesis. Recently, our laboratory has successfully synthesized [18F] choline, a radiopharmaceutical which is mainly used for probing prostate cancer and present improved and more applicable half-life (109.8 min) in comparison to the available [11C] choline (20.3 min)