ORNL celebrates 80 years of isotopes that changed medicine forever
Today, isotope innovations that continue to benefit patients, researchers and communities around the world.
80 years ago, a shipment out of Oak Ridge changed medicine forever.
On August 2, 1946, carbon-14 produced inside Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s X-10 Graphite Reactor shipped out to the Barnard Free Skin and Cancer Hospital in St. Louis. It’s widely considered the birth of modern nuclear medicine, and the moment nuclear research pivoted toward saving lives instead of just ending wars.
ORNL marked the 80th anniversary on Wednesday with a celebration looking back at that shipment and forward at where isotope science goes next.
Teknovation visited the X-10 Graphite Reactor at ORNL, which is now preserved as a museum, to learn about the history and impact that has grown since the discovery.
“That work has grown into an extraordinary national capability across generations,” said ORNL Director Dr. Stephen K. Streiffer. “Today, our scientists, engineers, and technicians develop unique expertise in producing, enriching, and processing isotopes that enable advances in nuclear energy, medicine, national security, and scientific discovery.”
He explained that the isotope discovery on the ORNL campus 80 years ago is foundational to what the lab does today.
“As we celebrate 80 years of isotope science at Oak Ridge, we’re also looking forward to the next 80 years. The capabilities we’re building today will help ensure that U.S. leadership in nuclear science remains true and opens possibilities we can only begin to imagine,” he said.
Isotopes are elements with varying masses that behave differently depending on the application. They make up everything from the sensor inside a smoke detector to therapies that target cancer cells directly. For cancer treatments, researchers can attach a radioactive isotope to a molecule that recognizes a specific type of cancer cell. When it decays, it kills that cell and only that cell, sparing the healthy tissue around it.
80 years later, the nuclear objective of the lab remains the same: getting discoveries out of the lab into the hands of the private industry to serve people.
“Knowledge creation is great, but ultimately we need to make sure that we’re serving the interests of the nation,” Streiffer said. “The isotope program is a great example of that.”
Today, the lab continues to produce isotopes through its High Flux Isotope Reactor, some of which are not made anywhere else on the planet. The team behind that continuous research and development, Streiffer said, is some of the best.
“Something I’m extraordinarily proud about at ORNL is exactly that team science approach. The fact that we bring all of these scientific disciplines together in a way that allows us to deliver what we like to say big science with big impact,” he said.
So what’s next?
It’s hard to say. A lot has happened in the past 80 years, and much innovation will continue to change the way we approach the production of isotopes and the field of medicine and nuclear technologies.
Standing inside the X-10 Graphite Reactor museum on ORNL’s campus brings the reality of the pace of innovation to light.
“The graphite reactor was important in the war effort during the 40s. It was essential to the way the West prevailed in that conflict. But if you look at this compared to modern reactors, it doesn’t look anything like it at all,” Streiffer said. “It’s a stark reminder of how fast technology moves… And a reminder that we are standing on the backs of the giants who came before us.”
And the same technology (with some new iterations) is still the foundation for saving lives 80 years later.
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