Naming Opportunity:
Linear Accelerator
$ 500,000

The accelerator is required for the production of radioactive tracers that are used for both the PET and the MicroPET programs.  For example, to image the density of specific receptors in the brain, molecules in tracer amounts are tagged with radioactive labels such as C¹¹.  The accelerator is required for the production of these radioactive tags.  Since many of many of these radioactive tracers are very short in their half-life (with some half-lives lasting on the order of seconds) they need to be made right on-site, adjacent to the PET scanners.  This is why the lab requires an accelerator on site.  Funds for this component of our operation are required to maintain and upgrade the accelerator, and to support the physicists who develop new methods using the accelerator.  The accelerator was purchased in 2000 for approximately $1M and requires continual upgrades.

A gift of $500,000 to the Brain Imaging Laboratory Endowment would provide a naming opportunity for this highly-specialized instrument that is integral to our PET studies.  These funds will enable us to continuously upgrade and maintain the accelerator and specifically to develop new targetry for specific radio-labels.  Support is also required to make long-term commitments to our physics staff who support the accelerator.