U.S. Nuclear Corp. Partners with Fusion Power Leader to Become Large Supplier in $10 Billion Radioisotope Market

DENVER, CO / ACCESSWIRE / January 30, 2018 / U.S. Nuclear (OTC PINK: UCLE) recently announced it signed a preliminary agreement with MIFTEC, a subsidiary of MIFTI, to become the exclusive contractor to manufacture medical isotope generators in the nuclear medicine market. MIFTI Nuclear Fusion was recognized and awarded by the U.S. Department of Energy, ARPA-E, for their innovative approach and rapid progress towards fusion energy, which could provide a nearly limitless supply of clean, domestic power. The announcement further stated, “MIFTI has shown that its Staged Z-Pinch fusion technique will produce high neutron flux, which in turn can be used to produce large quantities of lower cost medical radioisotopes that are in big demand and diminishing supply.” MIFTI and MIFTEC have created a revolutionary new way to produce large quantities of radioisotopes, and at a lower cost.

Radioisotopes are in short supply and are required for life-saving medical imaging and certain cancer treatments. According to Research and Markets ‘Global Nuclear Medicine Radioisotopes Market – Analysis and Forecasts (2015-2020)’, the market for nuclear medical radioisotopes was expected to be $9.61 billion in 2015 and is expected to reach $17.28 billion by the end of 2020.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine issued a report warning of the potential of severe shortages of radioisotopes. Radioisotopes are currently produced in a small number of older nuclear fission reactors that are subject to shut downs resulting in supply interruptions. Sarah Varney, NY Times author reported in her article, Inside the Global Relay Race to Deliver Moly-99, “Nuclear medicine imaging, a staple of American health care since the 1970s, runs almost entirely on Molybdenum-99, a radioisotope produced by nuclear fission of enriched uranium that decays so rapidly it becomes worthless within days. But moly-99, as it’s called, is created in just six government-owned nuclear research reactors – none in the USA raising concerns about the reliability of the supply and even prompting federal scientists to warn of the possibility of severe shortages.”

Three companies dominate the American market for moly-99 – Lantheus, Curium and GE.

They distribute the material to specialized pharmacies around the country where technicians process it into cartridges that dispense the diagnostic imaging agent called technetium-99m. The companies work against a ticking clock. Because of its short half-life, just 66 hours for moly-99 and six hours for the imaging agent, the material must be quickly delivered to hospitals and administered to patients.

Today, there are only two main sources of Moly-99 for use in the United States. They are the National Research Universal Reactor operated by Atomic Energy Canada, Ltd. at its Chalk River Ontario site and the High Flux Reactor operated by the Nuclear Research and Consultancy Group at the Petten, Netherlands site. Both reactors are over 40 years old. The Canadian NRU reactor which supplies 40% of the world’s moly-99 was only recently given a shut- down reprieve until March 31, 2018 subject to relicensing by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. The Netherlands HFR reactor has been forced to shut down on a number of occasions due to financial issues and hazardous waste leakage. The Netherlands plans to replace the HFR Petten reactor with the Pallas reactor. However, construction is not scheduled to finish until 2023 at a whopping cost estimated at 580M Euros.

MIFTEC will fundamentally change the way radiopharmaceuticals are created.

U.S. Nuclear Corp’s partner, MIFTI/MIFTEC developed a unique Staged Z-pinch (SZP) methodology to produce large quantities of radioisotopes. SZP is a safe, reliable, cost-effective, fusion-based process that uses a hydrogen isotope from seawater to create radionuclides without the environmental hazards of highly enriched uranium (HEU) or low enriched uranium (LEU) or the expense of the cyclotron or reactor method currently required to produce these products.

MIFTI/MIFTEC scientists at the University of California, Irvine, have successfully developed and patented a world-changing technology that will solve the current crisis of worldwide shortages in radionuclide/medical isotopes.

The MIFTI website says, “MIFTI knows of no other non-proliferating, fusion-based company currently in the nuclear medicine space. We are well-positioned to fundamentally change how radiopharmaceuticals are produced and distributed, and thus dominate a critical segment of the multi-billion-dollar nuclear medicine industry.”

This patented new technology enables production of large amounts of medical isotopes and can cut the current cost of production by 50%, thereby allowing even greater access to individuals that need them. Because of the very short lives of the radioisotopes, U.S. Nuclear and MIFTEC plan to have their generators operating at strategically placed distribution facilities in the United States that will be close to users and therefore will offer a significantly longer useful lifespan than today’s only options of distant nuclear power plants in Canada and Europe.

The MIFTI website under “Target Markets” says, “The use of nuclear medicine protocols has grown to over 20 million procedures per year in the United States alone. U.S. Nuclear and MIFTEC target markets include over 10,000 hospitals, clinics, laboratories, radio-pharmaceutical companies, and radio-analytical instrument manufacturers worldwide.”

According to their announcement, U.S. Nuclear Corp. and MIFTEC have agreed to U.S. Nuclear initially acquiring a 10% ownership interest in MIFTEC. The companies are open to discussions leading to a larger interest as they move forward as partners dedicated to becoming a major provider of badly needed radioisotopes.

Conclusion

If U.S. Nuclear and MIFTEC successfully produce radioisotopes with the technology they have already demonstrated, they could capture several billion dollars in sales. If U.S. Nuclear owns a 10% interest in the sales, U.S. Nuclear sales (about $2 million reported for 2016) could experience dramatic growth of 5000% for each billion in sales they recognize. That number could increase even further if they increase their ownership in the partnership. Investment risk seems to be mitigated somewhat by the fact that U.S. Nuclear continues to be a leader in its space, and their long history suggests that the company could experience reasonable growth even without the radioisotope opportunity.

If management executes on their new strategy to become the largest provider of lower-cost radioisotopes in a $17 Billion market, the impact to their short-term and long-term market valuation could be dramatic.

About US Nuclear Corp.

U.S. Nuclear Corp is a radiation detection holding company specializing in the development and manufacturing of radiation detection instrumentation. Through three operating divisions (Technical Associates (TA), Overhoff Technology (OTC), and Electronic Control Concepts (ECC), U.S. Nuclear Corp. harbors more than 100 years of combined experience in supplying top of the line instrumentation to any industry utilizing radionuclides. This includes nuclear power plants, national laboratories, government agencies, homeland security, military, universities and schools, research companies, hospitals, medical and dental centers, energy companies, weapons facilities, first responders, local governments, and manufacturing plants.

For more information about U.S. Nuclear Corp., please visit: www.usnuclearcorp.com

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SOURCE: Tamarack Advisors

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