MDS Nordion teams with TRIUMF to boost expertise in nuclear medicine

Multifaceted research collaboration

MDS Nordion and TRIUMF are taking their long-standing partnership to a new level with the first of several collaborative research agreements that typify the kind of industry-academic interaction that policy makers contend are essential to boost Canada's productivity and innovative capacity. The agreement will see the two organizations pursue both near-term and long-term R&D that will underpin MDS Nordion's growth strategy of becoming a world leader in targeted nuclear medicine.

In the near term, Ottawa-based MDS Nordion and TRIUMF will team with the Univ of British Columbia for a three-year R&D project to develop new diagnostic imaging agents or medical isotope products for diagnosing cancer and heart disease. MDS will provide $300,000 over the duration of the project with a matching amount from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council's collaborative R&D grants program. TRIUMF will provide personnel and infrastructure.

Helping to drive the medical side of the partnership is the BC Cancer Agency which has developed a working relationship with TRIUMF.

In the long term, MDS Nordion — a subsidiary of MDS Inc — will collaborate with TRIUMF to further develop its plans to produce molybdenum-99 (MO-99), medical isotopes created with photo fission using a high-powered electron linear accelerator rather than the traditional nuclear reactor method. Photo-fission-produced MO-99 accounts for a significant thrust in TRIUMF's new five-year plan, which was recently approved by an international peer review panel and the National Research Council. A Memorandum to Cabinet is now being prepared which could be approved by the summer.

Photo fission could play a critical role in generating sufficient supplies of medical isotopes for MDS, which had been counting on a new reactor type from Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd (AECL). After 12 years and hundreds of millions of dollars from both MDS and AECL, development of the MAPLE reactor was abruptly cancelled last year prompting MDS to launch a $1.6-billion lawsuit against AECL and the Government of Canada (R$, July 28/08).

"We have two business franchises which are still growing with sterilization and isotopes. This is the third leg of the stool – a new technology platforms in targeted imaging and therapy," says MDS Nordion president Steve West. "In the area of life sciences, 80% of innovation takes place in academia."

The decision to pursue different avenues of collaboration grew out of discussions between the heads of MDS Nordion and TRIUMF and follows MDS Nordion's collaborative agreement with the Univ of Ottawa and the Ottawa Heart Institute which has been operational for about one year.

"MDS is a growth-oriented company. We're building an innovation engine and looking for partnerships to become a world leader in nuclear medicine," says West. (The MDS-TRIUMF collaboration) is a model that leverages expertise in the area of biomedical research which Canada is very strong in. We want to bring products out of the lab and into the marketplace, from bench to bedside. Each piece is well defined. Who does what is the key."

For TRIUMF, the emphasis on developing new expertise in nuclear medicine is both a natural outgrowth of its 30-year medical isotope supply agreement with MDS and the focus of its director — Dr Nigel Lockyer — to boost its interaction with the private sector and enhance its leadership in the area of nuclear medicine.

"MDS is a major collaborator with TRIUMF and this is a research partnership … TRIUMF is mainly a research lab and our connection to MDS was seen mainly as an aside. I saw an opportunity to expand it," says Lockyer. "Right now it's focused on oncology but the research focus will naturally move into neurodegenerative diseases. For MDS it's an interesting new direction working with value-added products where molecules are attached to the isotope. It's a new direction and Steve West is driving it."

The three-year project to develop new diagnostic imaging agents involves the binding of radiometals to newly developed chelates — compounds that attach to radiometals and help to protect them as they are carried through the body.

seeking photo fission breakthrough

The development of a reactor using photo fission presents higher risk for both parties but promises potentially major benefits. The research agreement calls for MDS and TRIUMF to "study the feasibility of producing a viable and reliable supply of photo-fission-produced molybdenum-99". That entails developing a commercialization strategy that includes an operational plan, business model and time lines.

Photo-fission-based accelerators are far cheaper ($50-125 million) than nuclear reactors but require massive amounts of energy and heat build-up. TRIUMF is hoping to forge ahead with the development of superconducting radio frequency technology to facilitate the development of high-power electron beams necessary for photo fission (R$, November 30/08).

Ensuring a reliable supply of medical isotopes is behind the project to collaboratively develop a business case for photo fission. With the failure of the MAPLE reactor project and the increasingly precarious status of AECL's aging NRU reactor at its Chalk River ON facility, MDS is seriously exploring multiple sources for its medical isotopes to meet current and future demand for MO-99.

"This is a new dimension ... It's an alternative way to manufacture isotopes and the issue is to convert enough electricity at the right price to make it cost effective ... We've crafted a roadmap and a game plan going forward which is quite detailed," says West.

MDS was initially reluctant to embrace the photo fission concept late last year when TRIUMF announced its intention to pursue the technology. But West says its was too early to go public at that point and that serious consideration was already being given to the potential for a new phase of collaboration with TRIUMF.

Now that MDS' intention is clear, the aim is to have a demonstration model of the accelerator completed within three years. Lockyer says that photo-fission-produced MO-99 could be "part of the supply chain by 2015".

Lockyer adds that MDS is also interested in the whole supply chain for MO-99. Currently, the raw material MO-99 is produced using the AECL NRU reactor and then shipped to the US where two firms — Lantheus Medical Imaging (formerly Bristol Myers Squibb) and Covidien — utilize technetium generators and kits for further refinement and preparation before being distributed to customers worldwide.

MDS used to be in the generator business but exited some years ago. West says his company may reconsider.

"We always look at the business case and return on investment," he says. "If it works we will do that. We have not excluded it."

A recent Health Canada report says Canada should control the delivery of isotopes from beginning to end to minimize disruptions in supply that have occurred in the past.

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