Process for the separation and purification of yttrium-90 for medical applications

Claim 1

A process for the separation and purification of yttrium-90 from strontium-90 comprising: a) purifying an original 90 Sr solution by dissolving the residue remaining after evaporation of the original solution in nitric acid and passing it through a strontium-selective chromatographic column; b) stripping sorbed 90 Sr with dilute nitric acid; c) removing any traces of organic materials present in the purified 90 Sr by passing it through a bed of a polymeric sorbent; d) storing the 90 Sr solution for a sufficient period of time to allow 90 Y ingrowth to occur in the solution to provide a 90 Sr/ 90 Y mixture; e) acidifying the 90 Sr/ 90 Y mixture and passing the mixture through a series of strontium-selective extractant columns such that essentially all of the 90 Sr is retained on the columns and the effluent from the third column contains essentially only 90 Y; f) passing the 90 Y effluent through a rare-earth selective extractant such that 90 Y is retained while any residual 90 Sr is stripped away; g) eluting sorbed 90 Y from the rare-earth selective column; h) stripping each of the strontium-selective extractant columns of sorbed 90 Sr with dilute nitric acid and returning to storage to allow for new 90 Y growth.