Cyclotron production of 52 Mn and Monte Carlo benchmarking

52 Mn with 5.6 day half-life was produced by proton bombardment on natural chromium. Natural chromium was electroplated on the copper substrate and to reach a high activity product, the optimum energy range of bombardment was selected to be 16–6 MeV via theoretical calculation. It yielded 12.1 ± 1.2 MBq μA −1 h −1 after 1 h bombardment by the current of 150 μA. Separation of chromium and manganese was carried out by extraction method to achieve a more pure product. On the other hand, the production route, in parallel to this experiment, was simulated using Monte Carlo method, and the production yield was estimated and it showed a good agreement with the experimental results.