New TRIUMF-UBC training program aims to turn Vancouver into 'Isotope Valley'

A new interdisciplinary program at UBC and the TRUIMF national physics lab will provide young scientists with enriched training experiences in the production, preparation and innovative application of isotopes for science and health. 

The Isotopes for Science and Medicine (ISOSIM) CREATE program--announced today at a ceremony at McGill University by Minister of State (Science and Technology) Ed Holder--will help researchers transition from academia into the Canadian workforce.

ISOSIM will train undergraduate students, graduate students, and postdoctoral researchers at UBC and TRIUMF from fields associated with isotope sciences in an individually tailored, interdisciplinary curriculum that will build on and complement the education in their specialty field. Unique in Canada, this program offers a combination of interdisciplinary isotope-related training ranging from pure to applied sciences, industrial internships, and mobility with German research institutions with unique large-scale equipment and scientific infrastructures. 

“ISOSIM represents a timely and nationally important training initiative and is built on a world-class collaborative research environment,” says Reiner Kruecken, TRIUMF’s Science Division Head and Professor at UBC Department of Physics and Astronomy. Kruecken is leading the ISOSIM initiative and is joined by over twenty collaborators from UBC, TRIUMF, and several research institutes in Germany. 

ISOSIM is poised to create the next generation of leaders for isotope-related industries and markets, including commercial, public health, environmental, and governmental sectors, as well as academia. The combination of research institutions like UBC, TRIUMF and the BC Cancer Agency with Canadian companies like Nordion, and Advanced Cyclotron Solutions, have transformed Vancouver into a hub for isotope-related research and industries, emerging as 'Isotope Valley'.

The inspiration for the ISOSIM program came from an interdisciplinary TRIUMF-led team who, in response to the isotope crisis, demonstrated non-reactor methods for producing the critical medical isotope Tc-99m. This required a coordinated approach of physicists, chemists, biologists, and engineers. 

Similar interdisciplinary efforts are needed for expanding the use and application of isotopes in key areas. While their medical use is widely known, isotopes enjoy growing importance in many fields. Isotopes are used as tracers to examine the trace flow of nutrients and pollutants in the environment. Isotopes are also used to characterize newly designed materials and the behaviour of nanostructured materials that play a key role in modern electronics devices. The production and investigation of very short-lived radioactive isotopes, also known as rare-isotopes, is a central approach in nuclear physics research to understand the nuclear force and how the chemical elements heavier than iron were formed in stars and stellar explosions.