Estimation of specific activity of 177Lu by 'saturation assay' principle using DOTA as ligand.

Lutetium-177 is a widely used therapeutic radionuclide in targeted therapy and it is important to know its specific activity at the time of radiopharmaceutical preparation, especially for radiolabeling peptides. However, there are no direct methods for the experimental determination of the specific activity which can be readily applied in a hospital radiopharmacy. A new technique based on the 'saturation assay' principle using DOTA as the binding agent for the estimation of specific activity of 177Lu is reported. The studies demonstrate the proof of principle of this new assay technique. The method is general and can be modified and applied for the estimation of specific activity of other metallic radionuclides by using DOTA or other suitable chelating agents.