Dave Roberson wrote:
| I am not confident that there are sources of these metal isotopes at any
reasonable quantity. Actually, you might ask why they are available at all?
| Who needs Ni62, etc. without the others except for research labs perhaps?
My guess is that another research lab produced some for their internal
| project and would be happy to recover some of their costs by selling it
to another user. Do any of the isotopes of Nickel have a special purpose in
| medical or industrial applications? If not, then no one has gone to much
trouble seeking a way to separate them out.
| I suppose that even in the situation we are discussing, it will not be
important to follow up on this potential market. That does not mean that it is
not
| possible to do with the proper incentive.
... 64Ni is highly sought after for future use in the medical industry[1].
63Ni (a low energy beta emitter) is also apparently sought after
in the medical industries[2], as well as an energy source[3][4] and for
explosives detection[5] (62Ni is neutronated to produce 63Ni at
ORNL[6]).
... Isotope Enrichment/Separation/Production is performed mainly using 4
techniques: Electromagnet Isotope Separators or Calutrons[7][8],
Gas Centrifuges, Laser Isotope Separators or Nuclear Reactors. A Calutron is
basically a huge mass spectrometer with a very strong magnet;
you eventually collect/bin all the isotopes from the starting material, so
“deals” can sometimes be made on remaining/abundant isotopes
from the starting material...
... Actually, this topic has been well-covered here on Vortex[9][10]. This
wasn’t a very deep Vortex search, so there should be more info.
- Mark Jurich
[1] http://www.fas.org/policy/debates/20120716/raizen.html
[2]
http://www.phschool.com/science/science_news/articles/wanted_medical_isotopes.html
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_beta_emitters
[4] http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/10/021018080122.htm
[5]
http://www.epa.gov/radiation/source-reduction-management/radionuclides.html
[6] http://www.nscl.msu.edu/~mantica/radio-frib/runde-acsboston.pdf (Page 10)
[7] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calutron
[8]
http://isotope.info/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/enrichment-of-ni-58-by-electromagnetic-isotope-separator.pdf
[9] http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/msg63297.html
[10] http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/msg54207.html
