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Concept
Fluorine-18
Summary
Fluorine-18 (18F) is a fluorine radioisotope which is an important source of positrons. It has a mass of 18.0009380(6) u and its half-life is 109.771(20) minutes. It decays by positron emission 96% of the time and electron capture 4% of the time. Both modes of decay yield stable oxygen-18.
18F is a natural trace radioisotope produced by cosmic ray spallation of atmospheric argon as well as by reaction of protons with natural oxygen: 18O + p → 18F + n.
In the radiopharmaceutical industry, fluorine-18 is made using either a cyclotron or linear particle accelerator to bombard a target, usually of natural or enriched [18O]water with high energy protons (typically ~18 MeV). The fluorine produced is in the form of a water solution of [18F]fluoride, which is then used in a rapid chemical synthesis of various radio pharmaceuticals. The organic oxygen-18 pharmaceutical molecule is not made before the production of the radiopharmaceutical, as high energy protons destroy such molecules (radiolysis). Radiopharmaceuticals using fluorine must therefore be synthesized after the fluorine-18 has been produced.
First published synthesis and report of properties of fluorine-18 were in 1937 by Arthur H. Snell, produced by the nuclear reaction of 20Ne(d,α)18F in the cyclotron laboratories of Ernest O. Lawrence.
Fluorine-18 is often substituted for a hydroxyl group in a radiotracer parent molecule, due to similar steric and electrostatic properties. This may however be problematic in certain applications due to possible changes in the molecule polarity.
Fluorine-18 is one of the early tracers used in positron emission tomography (PET), having been in use since the 1960s.
Its significance is due to both its short half-life and the emission of positrons when decaying.
A major medical use of fluorine-18 is: in positron emission tomography (PET) to image the brain and heart; to image the thyroid gland; as a radiotracer to image bones and seeking cancers that have metastasized from other locations in the body and in radiation therapy treating internal tumors.
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