Automated radiosynthesis of [18F]ciprofloxacin

• Automated synthesis of [18F]ciprofloxacin in a TRACERlabTM FXFDG (GE Healthcare) synthesis module was developed.
• Dependence of radiochemical yield on reactor type was observed.
• 3-mL V-shaped borosilicate glass reactor gave higher radiochemical yield as compared with standard 15-mL glassy carbon reactor.
• V-shaped borosilicate glass reactor might also give higher radiochemical yield for other [18F]radiotracers than [18F]ciprofloxacin.

We transferred the previously published manual synthesis of [18F]ciprofloxacin (decay-corrected RCY: 5.5±1.0%) to an automated synthesis module (TRACERlabTM FXFDG, GE Healthcare) and observed a strong decrease in RCY (0.4±0.4%). When replacing the standard 15-mL glassy carbon reactor of the synthesis module with a 3-mL V-shaped borosilicate glass reactor a considerable improvement in RCY was observed. [18F]Ciprofloxacin was obtained in a RCY of 2.7±1.4% (n=23) with a specific activity at EOS of 1.4±0.5 GBq/µmol in a synthesis time of 160 min.

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