The Brief
Actinide Inc., a Plano-based company, has created a particle accelerator that can produce Ytterbium-176, a material for cancer treatment.
Drug maker Novartis uses Ytterbium-176 to create a targeted therapy that delivers radiation directly to cancer cells to destroy them from within.
The company hopes to scale up its production of Ytterbium-176 from grams to kilograms, which would help end foreign reliance on the material.
PLANO, Texas – A Plano-based company has made a breakthrough in making materials in cancer treatment that help fight cancer cells from within the body.
Actinide Inc. and Ytterbium-176
Local perspective
Actinide Inc. is a Plano-based company that produces Ytterbium-176, a material that can be used for cancer drugs and providing fuel for nuclear reactors.
Ytterbium-176 is made with the company’s particle accelerator, named Endurance, by turning metal into plasma and accelerating it to the speed of light through a magnet.
The material is worth around $30,000 for a gram.
The particle accelerator also creates High-Assay Low-Enriched Uranium, or HALEU, which can be used as fuel for small nuclear reactors.
Big picture view
Novartis, which makes cancer-fighting drugs, uses Ytterbium-176 to create a targeted cancer treatment that delivers radiation directly into cancer cells to destroy them from within the body.
What they’re saying
“This is the precursor material to a new wave of cancer therapeutics known as radio pharmaceuticals.”
Eric Olszewski, the CEO of Actinide Inc., says he and his business partner Robert Mendelsohn knew their particle accelerator could be configured to do more.
“We were able to make a next-generation fuel for small format reactors at an experimental scale to demonstrate the technology,” Olszewski tells FOX 4’s Lori Brown.
What’s next
Actinide Inc. is seeking to scale up their production of Ytterbium-176 from grams to kilograms.
The company says scaling up production will help end reliance on foreign materials for the cancer drugs and uranium.
The Source
Information in this story comes from an interview with leadership at Actinide Inc.