Fusion Energy Will Help Treat Cancer ⚡ экспресс
Scientists have found a way to use a fusion reactor—like a tiny sun—to turn ordinary substances into precious isotopes for treating cancer. This 'factory' can churn them out in abundance, without the hazardous nuclear waste. Picture it: a room-sized setup could supply rare medicines to the whole planet—isn't that a miracle?
Deep inside stars, light nuclei fuse, giving birth to helium and streams of neutrons. On Earth, we recreate this process by combining deuterium and tritium—special isotopes of hydrogen. When they merge, neutrons are born, which, like a philosopher’s stone, turn stable elements into precious radioactive isotopes—the basis for cancer diagnosis and therapy. These transformations follow the Standard Model of physics.
The method leaves no long-lived waste, and the desired isotope is extracted chemically. The idea traces back to the experiments of Enrico Fermi and Ernest Rutherford, who nearly a hundred years ago first altered atomic nuclei with neutrons. Astonishingly, to meet the global demand for technetium-99m (30 million procedures annually), the neutrons from a desk-sized device would suffice. Moreover, the technology doesn’t use weapons-grade materials, eliminating the proliferation risk.
🎯 Iodine-131, produced in such a source, selectively destroys thyroid cancer. [tag:spectroscopy]Spectroscopy[/tag] lets doctors watch the process in real time.