How are radiopharmaceuticals made?

How are radiopharmaceuticals made?

Well, there is a whole branch that we call radiochemistry, and that is very active. It is not only clinical but also a research area. In radiochemistry, basically, we design pharmaceuticals from scratch depending upon what we know or understand about the physiology of a question. Then, these pharmaceuticals are designed based on that, and then depending on what that chemistry is, what that pharmacy of that chemistry is, then a radioactive material can be placed in a certain part of that molecule that is chemically stable and is useful. So actually, it is a rather complex field. As I said, there are people who get doctorates in radiochemistry which designs these kinds of things. It is a very exciting field because we have to understand physiology, biochemistry, chemistry and radioactivity, physics basically.