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Energy Fuels Announces Strategic Alliance with RadTran, LLC for the Recovery of Isotopes Needed for Emerging Cancer Therapeutics
Alliance has the potential to develop commercial technologies and sources of isotopes needed for a new domestic medical supply chain LAKEWOOD, Colo., July 29, 2
About this update from Energy Fuels Inc.
[{"type":"text","content":" Alliance has the potential to develop commercial technologies and sources of isotopes needed for a new domestic medical supply chain LAKEWOOD, Colo., July 29, 2021 /CNW/ - Energy Fuels Inc. (NYSE American: UUUU) (TSX: EFR) (\"Energy Fuels\" or the \"Company\") is pleased to announce the execution of a Strategic Alliance Agreement (\"Alliance\") with RadTran, LLC (\"RadTran\") to evaluate the recovery of thorium, and potentially radium, from the Company's existing rare earth carbonate (\"RE Carbonate\") and uranium process streams for use in the production of medical isotopes for emerging targeted alpha therapy (\"TAT\") cancer therapeutics. This initiative will complement the Company's existing uranium and RE Carbonate businesses, as it will investigate the recovery of isotopes in existing process streams at Energy Fuels' White Mesa Mill in Utah (the \"Mill\") for medical purposes. RadTran is a Denver, Colorado-based technology development company focused on closing critical gaps in the procurement of medical isotopes for these applications. Uranium and thorium are long-lived (long \"half life\"), naturally occurring radioactive elements that decay into a series of different elements through the successive loss of alpha or beta particles. Certain elements in or derived from the uranium and thorium decay chains have short half-lives and emit alpha particles. These alpha emitting isotopes are currently being studied by major pharmaceutical companies developing therapies to treat cancer on a cellular level, while minimizing damage to surrounding healthy tissue. However, existing domestic and global supplies of these isotopes are in short supply, and existing methods of production are costly and currently unable to scale-up to meet widespread demand as new drugs are developed and approved in the U.S., Europe and around the World. These are major roadblocks in the research and development of new TAT drugs, as pharmaceutical companies wait for scalable and affordable production technologies to become available. The Mill can represent a possible solution to this medical supply chain issue. The Mill is the only licensed and operating conventional uranium mill in the U.S., and it recently began production of RE Carbonate from natural monazite sands. Monazite sands, natural uranium ores, and certain other feed sources for the Mill contai...