# Copper-67

Source: https://nuclide.cc/isotopes/cu-67/  
Nuclide record `cu-67` (Isotope). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from Nuclide (nuclide.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

A radioactive form of copper that pairs with a diagnostic twin made of the same element, copper-64. Using the same metal for the scan and the treatment means the tracer behaves identically both times, which should make dosing more predictable.

## Summary

Copper-67 decays purely by beta-minus emission with a physical half-life of 61.8-62 hours (about 2.58 days) to stable zinc-67, with a mean beta energy of about 141 keV (maximum energies at 377, 468 and 562 keV) and useful imaging gammas at 93 keV and 184.6 keV (about 49% abundance), which support SPECT-based dosimetry.

Its principal theranostic appeal is chemical identity with copper-64, the positron-emitting isotope used for PET imaging of the same chelator-conjugated agent (e.g. SAR-bisPSMA, SARTATE): the same molecule with the same biodistribution can be imaged pre-therapy with 64Cu and then dosed with 67Cu, avoiding the surrogate mismatch inherent in most other theranostic pairs.

Production historically used reactor or lower-energy cyclotron reactions (67Zn(n,p)67Cu, 68Zn(p,2p)67Cu, 70Zn(p,α)67Cu), each limited to modest specific activity. A step change came from high-energy bremsstrahlung photonuclear production, 68Zn(γ,p)67Cu, using electron linear accelerators to irradiate enriched 68Zn targets; the US Department of Energy Isotope Program's Low Energy Accelerator Facility (LEAF) uses this route to supply no-carrier-added 67Cu at specific activities above 1850 GBq/mg. Clarity Pharmaceuticals and the DOE Isotope Program are among the groups scaling supply; 67Cu is not dependent on nuclear reactor neutron flux, so it avoids the reactor-capacity bottleneck that constrains 177Lu and 225Ac.

## Fields

- Kind: Isotope
- Status: phase-2
- Last checked: 2026-09-22
- Also known as: 67Cu; Cu-67
- Tags: therapy; beta emitter; theranostic pair

## Sources

- Recent Advances in 64Cu/67Cu-Based Radiopharmaceuticals (Pharmaceutics, 2023): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10288943/
- 67Cu Production Capabilities: A Mini Review (Front Med, 2022): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8912090/
- Copper-67 radioimmunotheranostics for simultaneous immunotherapy and immuno-SPECT (Scientific Reports, 2021): https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-82812-1
- Clarity Pharmaceuticals: Copper-64 and Copper-67 - The Perfect Theranostic Pairing: https://www.claritypharmaceuticals.com/technology/copper-isotopes/

## Connected records

- trials: [64Cu-LNTH-1363S in Patients With Sarcoma or Gastrointestinal Tract Cancer](https://nuclide.cc/trials/nct06298916/), [64Cu-SAR-bisPSMA and 67Cu-SAR-bisPSMA for Identification and Treatment of PSMA-expressing Metastatic Castrate Resistant Prostate Cancer (SECuRE)](https://nuclide.cc/trials/nct04868604/)
- companies: [Clarity Pharmaceuticals](https://nuclide.cc/companies/clarity-pharmaceuticals/), [Niowave](https://nuclide.cc/companies/niowave/), [Nuclidium](https://nuclide.cc/companies/nuclidium/)
- isotopes: [Copper-64](https://nuclide.cc/isotopes/cu-64/)
- drugs: [Copper-64 SAR-bisPSMA](https://nuclide.cc/drugs/cu-64-sar-bispsma/)
- ideas: [A single-molecule copper-64/copper-67 pair instead of switching ligands between scan and treatment](https://nuclide.cc/ideas/idea-copper-theranostic-pair-standard/)
- technologies: [Sarcophagine chelation](https://nuclide.cc/technologies/sarcophagine-chelation/)

---
JSON: https://nuclide.cc/api/v1/entities/cu-67.json