Highlights 2023 - Exploring
We strengthen our pioneering light and increase our social impact by joining forces with strategic partners. By working together, we are accelerating progress. Examples include consortia to build a lead-cooled Small Modular Reactor, to dismantle cyclotrons and to develop new targeted cancer treatments.
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Leaders in heavy liquid metal technology join forces for deploying Lead-Cooled Small Modular Reactors
Exploring innovative nuclear systems
8 November 2023Five leaders in heavy liquid metal technology join forces to speed up the industrial deployment of Small Modular Reactors (SMR). These prominent international partners are Ansaldo Nucleare, ENEA, RATEN, SCK CEN and Westinghouse Electric Company. Their collaborative journey begins with the demonstration of Lead Fast Reactor Technology, showcasing its potential.
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New partnership with MAGICS aims to revolutionize cementitious waste monitoring and contamination mapping techniques
Exploring the nuclear lifecycle
7 December 2023A joint effort between SCK CEN and MAGICS is under way to develop advanced technologies that promise groundbreaking improvements in the monitoring and prediction of damage caused by ASR-DEF reactions in cementitious radioactive waste forms. At the same time, the collaboration seeks to bring about an improvement in contamination mapping methodology, enhancing the efficiency and accuracy of the radiological characterisation process.
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Five Belgian companies create CYCLADE: a centre of expertise for the decommissioning of accelerators and cyclotrons
Exploring the nuclear lifecycle
9 March 2023While the first facilities date back more than 30 years, it is estimated that approximately 200 medical cyclotron facilities worldwide are awaiting dismantling by 2040. This is equivalent to processing 18,000 tons of steel and other metals in the most sustainable way possible. Five Belgian companies (IBA, Interboring, IRE, SCK CEN and Transrad) - specialists in dismantling and nuclear medicine - are joining forces for this purpose.
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New project ‘LINAC@LNK’ focuses on better calibrations for radiotherapy and characterisation of radioactive waste
Exploring the nuclear lifecycle
7 October 20203Hitting two targets with one shot – no other idiom sums up the LINAC@LNK project so nicely. SCK CEN is purchasing a medical linear accelerator to investigate two big questions: can we make radiotherapy even more efficient? And – more surprisingly – can we also better characterize radioactive waste drums with this medical device?
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Advanced measurement techniques as the key to minimize and safely dispose radioactive decommissioning waste
Exploring the nuclear lifecycle
2 March 2023Do we want to reuse and recycle the bulk of materials from the decommissioning of Belgian nuclear power plants as much as possible and dispose of the remaining radioactive waste safely? Then we need to improve our knowledge and technologies. Let that be precisely the goal of the SCK CEN ANUBIS project. With the support of the European Union, SCK CEN is joining forces with various industrial players. Three separate collaborations are currently underway.
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Ground-breaking ceremony for RECUMO
Exploring the nuclear lifecycle
13 February 2023From 2026 onwards, the nuclear research centre SCK CEN will transform radioactive residues into low-enriched uranium and will purify them in its brand new RECUMO facility. These residues resulting from the production of medical radioisotopes on the site of the Institut National des Radioéléments (IRE). On 13 February 2023, the first sod was turned for the RECUMO building. With it, IRE and SCK CEN are literally creating a European first on Belgian soil.
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New SCK CEN production facility helps more cancer patients
Exploring nuclear medicine
28 November 2023Starting in 2026, the nuclear research centre SCK CEN will commission a brand-new production facility for therapeutic radioisotopes. This facility, called CRF, represents a vital step forward in the fight against cancer. November 2023, the foundation stone was symbolically laid - in the presence of patient Francis Ligot, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Stella Kyriakides, and Belgian Minister for Energy Tinne Van der Straeten.
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The Netherlands and Belgium stand shoulder to shoulder against cancer
Exploring nuclear medicine
14 June 2023Cancer is on the rise worldwide. The Dutch company TerThera and the Belgian nuclear research centre SCK CEN want to stop it in its tracks. In one swift stroke of the hand, they throw everything into the fight against cancer: unique expertise, advanced techniques and uninterrupted access to ... Gadolinium - one of 17 rare earth metals. This is the necessary raw material for Terbium-161, an emerging talent among therapeutic radioisotopes.
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The United States and Belgium partner to accelerate the fight against cancer
Exploring nuclear medicine
26 May 2023US-Based SpectronRx will open its first European radiolabeling facility for sorely needed medical radioisotopes. This facility will be established on the premises of the Belgian Nuclear Research Center SCK CEN in Mol, Belgium. It will be operational in 2024 and will focus on actinium-225. This promising therapeutic radioisotope shows great potential in the treatment of cancer.
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BR2 made every production second of 2023 count in the fight against cancer
Exploring nuclear medicine
4 February 2024In a world where every minute counts in the race against cancer, our BR2 research reactor did not let a single second of production slip by in 2023. “We achieved 100% of the production days we announced. In short: 100% availability and reliability for patients,” said Steven Van Dyck, Director of BR2 at the nuclear research centre SCK CEN.
Would you like to explore the realizations within our 'Guaranteeing' domains?