Proton beams generated with high-intensity lasers: Applications to medical isotope production

Abstract : Proton beams of up to 10 MeV have been obtained by the interaction of a 10 Hz “table-top” laser, focused to intensities of 6×10^19 W/cm^2, with 6-μm-thin foil targets. Such proton beams can be used to induce 11B(p,n)11C reactions, which could yield an integrated activity of 13.4 MBq (0.36 mCi) after 30 min laser irradiation. This can be extended to GBq levels using similar lasers with kilohertz repetition rates, making this positron-emission tomography isotope production scheme comparable to the one using conventional accelerators.