Date/Time
Date(s) - 27/03/2025
1:30 pm - 2:20 pm

Title: Towards Availability, Safety, and Efficacy of Targeted Radiopharmaceutical Therapy

Date: Thursday March 27, 2025

Time: 1:30-2:20pm

Room: MDCL 1309

Host: Dr. James Inkster

Abstract: 
Radiopharmaceutical therapy has demonstrated encouraging clinical results in cancer treatment, which stimulated significant attention from the research community, clinicians, and the industry. The radiopharmaceutical therapy is expected to produce pointed killing effect on cancer lesions while avoiding toxicity to the healthy organs and tissues, which can result in better tolerability in comparison with standard-of-care treatments. To progress therapeutic radiopharmaceuticals from scientific curiosity to routine medicines, research and development is still required, including in large-scale production of useful radionuclides, optimization of targeting biological vectors, and understanding of radiobiological effects and mechanisms of action of candidate drugs. This lecture will showcase how our research laboratory contributes to addressing some of these questions.

Biography: 
Dr. Svetlana Selivanova is Section Head for Radiochemistry and Medical Applications at Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) and adjunct professor at the Faculty of Pharmacy, Université Laval. She holds MSc in chemistry and PhD in radiopharmaceutical chemistry and radiobiology. Before joining CNL, she held senior positions, both in research and management, at CHU de Quebec-Université Laval, Sherbrooke University Hospital, and at the Center for Radiopharmaceutical Sciences of ETH Zurich (Switzerland). Dr. Selivanova is an active member of several professional societies, currently serving as Executive Member of the Canadian Association of Radiopharmaceutical Scientists, President of the SNMMI Radiopharmaceutical Sciences Council, and Vice-Chair for the Educational Programming at the SNMMI Annual Meetings. Internationally, she is expert-consultant for the International Atomic Energy Agency and the European Research Council. Among major accomplishments are her contribution to R&D and translation effort to produce Tc-99m with cyclotron; and implementation of investigational prostate cancer radiopharmaceutical at CHU de Quebec University Hospital, first in Canada. Dr. Selivanova’ research interests are in the development and translation of novel radiopharmaceuticals from bench to clinics and in nuclear imaging as a tool for studying biochemical pathways in vivo.