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A Glance at the

History of

Nuclear

Medicine Dr Mandakinee Phukan

Associate Professor
Department of Nuclear Medicine
State Cancer Institute, Guwahati

he word “nuclear” triggers fear, but it also named it radioactivity. They discovered two new
inspires a lot. Peaceful nuclear technology elements, radium and polonium. Ernest Rutherford
Thas been powering people’s lives since the started his work to dissect the atom. He identified
dawn of nuclear age more than half a century ago. alpha and beta particles. Together with FSoddy,
Nuclear Technology in the field of Nuclear Medicine he examined the temporal properties of the
is an example of its peaceful use. Birth of Nuclear radioactive decay and the transformation of
Medicine occurred after the Second World War. one element to another or a physically divergent
After the attack on Pearl Harbour, the United States form of the same element. Soddy named them
developed Nuclear reactors to produce atom as isotopes. Rutherford was able to show that the
bombs, which were dropped on the Japanese mass of an atom is concentrated in a small nucleus
cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. After the war, the with the electrons occupying orbits around
US lead the campaign for application of Atomic it. This formed the basis of the atomic theory
Energy for Peace, which stimulated implementation proposed by Niels Bohr in 1913. In 1934, I.Curie and
of knowledge of nuclear energy for medical F.Joliot produced an artificial radionuclide called
applications like production of radio-nuclides. Phosphorus -30 by bombarding aluminium with

In Nuclear Medicine, the use of radioactive neutrons from a radium-beryllium source. This
isotopes is essential. However, Radioactivity introduction of artificial radioactivity prompted
has been discovered long before the Second the invention of cyclotrons and reactors. The
World War. The discovery of X–rays on November majority of radionuclides are artificially produced
8,1895, was reported to the French Academy of in cyclotron and reactor.
Science in January, 1896. One of its members was A cyclotron is a type of particle accelerator. It
the physicist Henry Becquerel. He thought that was invented by Ernest O.Lawrence in 1929–
the new rays were generated from the point of the 1930 at the University of California,Berkeley. In
discharge tube which emitted fluorescent light a cyclotron,charged particles such as protons,
when it was hit by cathode rays. He used a salt of deuterons, alpha particles, helium particles and so
uranium and potassium and showed that, after forth are accelerated in circular paths under vacuum
being exposed to sunlight this substance emitted under electromagnetic field. These accelerated
radiation which could penetrate black paper and charged particles acquire high kinetic energy and
blacken a photographic plate. Thus in 1896, Henri can interact with target nuclei of other elements.
Becquerel first discovered natural radioactivity in Nuclear reactions thus take place and new short
potassium uranyl sulfate. Marie and Pierre Curie lived radionuclides are formed which can be used

20 Fight Cancer with Knowledge. 21