Application of Nuclear Recoil to Radioisotope Enrichment of Copper-64

Feasibility of Simplified Chemical Processing of Water-Soluble Copper Phthalocyanine

Abstract

A new target material has been proposed for nuclear recoil enrichment of ⁶⁴Cu. This radionuclide was hitherto produced by tedious chemical processing using concentrated sulfuric acid solution of neutron irradiated copper phthalocyanine. Simplified chemical processes using a water-soluble copper phthalocyanine derivative, octacarboxyphthalocyanato copper (II), have been adopted in this work. Two methods of separation involving solvent extraction and precipitation have been tested. Higher specific activity of ⁶⁴Cu has been obtained for the extraction method than for the precipitation method. Feasibility of the extraction method in ⁶⁴Cu enrichment is discussed.