Nuclear Technology Review 2011 - IAEA

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complements to the sterile insect technique to manage insect pests in an environmentally friendly way. In 2010, mutations or naturally occurring heritable changes in the genetic material of plants continued to be successfully exploited to identify and select traits that are important for crop improvement. Nuclear techniques for mutation induction can increase the rates of the genetic changes and thus the adaptability of crops to climate change and variability. Nuclear technology packages based on mutation induction and efficiency enhancing molecular technologies and biotechnologies, including tissue culture and high throughput molecular technologies, have been developed to help to identify and exploit key traits for climate change and variability adaptation. In the human health area, advances that continued in 2010 in radiation oncology are leading to improved treatment such that it is now possible to more precisely match the irradiated volume to the shape of the tumour and thereby better preserve healthy neighbouring tissue. The three dimensional conformal radiotherapy (3-D–CRT) is being used to design treatment fields that are focused on the targeted tumour. Respiratory gated radiotherapy takes into account organ and tumour movement during patient respiration. This is particularly relevant for tumours located in the chest, the larynx, the abdomen, the prostate and the bladder, as well as the pelvis in general. In this computer driven radiotherapy, the programme analyses the movements and triggers the treatment beam at the appropriate time. Advances in nuclear medicine during the last three years have led to reductions in both scanning time as well as the radiation dose administered to patients while improving the overall image quality that allows for a more confident and efficient diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases. New detector material such as cadmium zinc telluride (CZT) combined with focused pinhole collimation and 3-D reconstruction is now used in traditional SPECT imaging to reduce the scanning time. The outbreak of harmful algal blooms (HABs) in coastal areas can lead to significant economic losses through the damage to seafood that is harvested for both domestic as well as for export purposes. Nuclear techniques allow for an accurate and rapid assessment of such HABs as a means to support the efforts of national regulatory bodies to ensure the safety of seafood. The 2010 annual meeting of the Scientific Association Dedicated to Analytical Excellence (AOAC) identified the receptor binding assay (RBA) method, a nuclear technology based on the use of radiolabelled toxins, as one of the two developed alternative methods that have been successfully tested in prevalidation studies. Long lived radionuclides are being used to investigate marine resources, oceanographic processes and to assess marine contamination in support of coastal zone management. Due to their own decay over time, radionuclides allow 3
esearchers to date and study such large scale environmental processes, as well as obtain data otherwise not accessible. Stable and radioactive isotopes are being used in time and cost effective studies of groundwater resources in, for example, the Guarani Aquifer System of South America, the Tadla Basin of Morocco, and the Nubian Sandstone Aquifer System of northern Africa. The obtained isotope data have been used in 2010 to confirm traditional hydrological studies and to provide insight into groundwater flow and aquifer dynamics, all of which contribute to comprehensive groundwater management. The importance of radioisotopes and radiopharmaceuticals continued to grow in 2010. The use of highly specific radiopharmaceuticals as biomarkers of molecular processes underlying a disease, an approach known as ‘molecular imaging’, is increasing as they serve either as an early indicator of the disease, or as an objective parameter for measuring the efficacy of treatment, particularly for cancer patients. Technical challenges resulted in recurrent, extended, and often coincident research reactor shutdowns that contributed to further prolonging the molybdenum-99 supply crisis which began in late 2007. Coordinated, worldwide efforts to improve demand side efficiency, reduce transport challenges and approve capable reactors for target irradiation significantly helped mitigate the impact of the crisis throughout 2010. South Africa became the first major producer to deliver industrial scale quantities of LEU based molybdenum-99 for export in 2010 and large scale production of molybdenum-99 also began in December 2010 at the Research Institute of Atomic Reactors in Dimitrovgrad, Russian Federation. Furthermore, the shortages faced in the supplies of fissionproduced molybdenum-99, and in turn of technetium-99m generators, have also led to increased interest in exploring and developing alternative technologies for their production, in particular those that do not use HEU. In addition, making use of accelerator based approaches would help reduce the sole dependence on aged reactors serving the fission molybdenum-99 industry. Canadian researchers are investigating cyclotron based direct production of technetium-99m, as a near term alternative, at medical centres that are located near low or medium energy cyclotrons. Recent developments in industrial radiation technology applications include integrated radiotracer and computer simulation approaches for sediment management. In 2009-2010, radiotracer investigations using scandium-46 labelled glass powder as a tracer were carried out at an existing dumping site and two proposed dumping sites in India. The results indicated that the existing site and one of the proposed sites were suitable for dumping dredged sediments, while the other proposed site was not. 4
Page 2 and 3: NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY REVIEW 2011
Page 4 and 5: NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY REVIEW 2011 INTE
Page 6 and 7: CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY. . . . .
Page 8: ANNEX II: ENHANCING FOOD SAFETY AND
Page 11: when, where and how they will build
Page 15 and 16: TABLE A-1. NUCLEAR POWER REACTORS I
Page 17 and 18: In some European countries, where r
Page 19 and 20: esults in increased electricity dem
Page 21 and 22: 2008, an increase of 133% on the 20
Page 23 and 24: Corporation (Rosatom) and placed un
Page 25 and 26: induction melter at the R7 plant in
Page 27 and 28: dismantling and removal of all inte
Page 29 and 30: B.1. Advanced fission 6 20 B. ADVAN
Page 31 and 32: Generation IV International Forum
Page 33 and 34: sustainable nuclear energy systems,
Page 35 and 36: 26 C. ATOMIC AND NUCLEAR DATA The m
Page 37 and 38: 28 FIG. C-3. LCLS X ray free electr
Page 39 and 40: Restoration Centre of the Museums o
Page 41 and 42: facilities, from HEU to LEU. In 200
Page 43 and 44: 34 E. NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGIES IN FOOD
Page 45 and 46: FIG. E-1. Parasitoid females probin
Page 47 and 48: 38 Applying existing tools to chara
Page 49 and 50: spatial and temporal scales and, he
Page 51 and 52: F.1. Nutrition 42 F. HUMAN HEALTH S
Page 53 and 54: The scanning time is reduced to a f
Page 55 and 56: The demand from Member States for t
Page 57 and 58: 48 H. WATER RESOURCES 20 Studies us
Page 59 and 60: I.1.2. Security of supplies of moly
Page 61 and 62: FIG. I-2. Sketch of GPS integrated
Page 64 and 65:
Annex I RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN THE
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Safety margins are used in order to
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Fig. I-2. A linear accelerator comm
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movements and triggers the treatmen
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I-3.4. Introduction of advanced tec
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isotope with a half-life of 5.27 ye
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[I-11] BRADA, M., PIJLS-JOHANNESMA,
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necessary. Such action can reduce t
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elated to carbon dioxide uptake and
Page 82 and 83:
infancy. The development and applic
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The limitations inherent in analyti
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[II-19] RHODES, et al., Emerging Te
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If most of the recharge is derived
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FIG. III-2. Field work at a coastal
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under semi-arid and arid conditions
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FIG. III-3. Map of the Guaraní Aqu
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colours) compared to the west side
Page 98 and 99:
FIG. III-6. Map showing the locatio
Page 100 and 101:
FIG. III-7. Oblique views of the ge
Page 102:
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