UW-Madison held a groundbreaking on Oct. 23 for a $62 million project that adds two cyclotrons to its medical radioisotope operation, with completion expected by May 2028. The university says production capacity will rise two- to eightfold, depending on the isotope. ANS Nuclear Newswire reported the ceremony on Nov. 2. The additions are meant to widen a national supply of medical isotopes that the project’s director describes as short, and to give researchers access to alpha emitters that existing equipment could not produce.
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The new space is a 13,000-square-foot building within the Wisconsin Institutes for Medical Research complex, and one of the two machines is described by the university as the first modern alpha-particle cyclotron of its kind installed in the United States. The facility is intended to host diagnostic imaging work, clinical trials in theranostics, and training programs.
Funding: $48.5 million, a regents vote and federal money
Wisconsin Public Radio reported before the ceremony that the university had already secured $48.5 million, and that the UW Board of Regents approved an additional $13.5 million in 2025. Those two amounts add up to the $62 million total. The Daily Cardinal covered the regents’ Sept. 18 vote and reported that researchers found the new structure needs considerably more complex infrastructure than first planned, which drove the increase.
ANS Nuclear Newswire lists the funders as the National Institutes of Health, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and private donors. WPR separately notes a $10 million NIH grant for the project but does not say whether it sits inside the $62 million.
Alpha emitters and astatine-211
The machines can produce isotopes the older technology could not, including astatine-211, a rare alpha-emitting isotope. A Texas A&M account of the same isotope explains why researchers want it. Its half-life is 7.2 hours, short enough to limit toxicity, and its alpha particles travel only a short distance, so they destroy cancer cells near a tumor with minimal harm to surrounding tissue. Sherry Yennello, who directs the Texas A&M Cyclotron Institute and leads that school’s program, says astatine-211 has shown significant promise against blood, ovarian and certain brain cancers, and it is in clinical trials for blood cancers.
Those isotopes support theranostics, which pairs diagnostic imaging with targeted radiation therapy. UW-Madison’s work also covers PET and SPECT imaging, the training of health care workers in molecular imaging and radiopharmaceutical science, and research into Alzheimer’s disease.
WPR described the layout in more detail. The lab sits in the basement of the Wisconsin Institutes for Medical Research, the expansion adds a second cyclotron of the same kind as the existing one, which will stay in service, and it adds the alpha-particle machine. New floors above will provide research space while the basement stays dedicated to the cyclotrons. AuntMinnie places the building between two research buildings on Highland Avenue.
The Daily Cardinal reported in 2025 that the machines will supply materials for medical imaging and nuclear medicine therapy and produce several new isotopes for diagnostic, therapeutic and research use, at a time of federal research funding cuts. Anjon Audhya, senior associate dean at the School of Medicine and Public Health, said then that the goal is to be the preeminent site for preclinical and clinical theranostics research globally.
Supply for trials and the people behind the project
Jonathan Engle, who directs the UW-Madison Cyclotron Research Group, said the country faces a national shortage of medical isotopes and that the new facility is meant to address it. He told Wisconsin Public Radio that radionuclides could be among the best tools against malignant disease over the next 20, 30 or 40 years, and in 2025 he told the Daily Cardinal that supplying materials for imaging and therapy is one of the main purposes. In WPR’s pre-ceremony report, he compared the beam’s job to a pitcher delivering a ball to home plate: it needs enough energy to reach its target.
The university has produced radioisotopes for about a decade as a member of the Department of Energy University Isotope Network, and AuntMinnie reports it plans to extend supply to clinical trials and research centers once the facility is finished. Provost John Zumbrunnen said at the groundbreaking that very few institutions can offer training spanning both the foundational science a cyclotron enables and the clinical applications, and that UW-Madison would be one of them. Regent Amy Bogost, Dean Nita Ahuja, Secretary Kathy Blumenfeld and Vice Chancellor Dorota Grejner-Brzezinska also attended.
The schedule has already moved once. The Daily Cardinal reported in October 2025 that the building was expected to be ready in 2027, while the groundbreaking coverage points to May 2028. Whether the larger budget and a more complex structure push the date further is the open question for the isotope shortage Engle describes. Until the cyclotrons run, the production capacity UW-Madison has today stays where it is, and the two- to eightfold increase is a projection tied to the May 2028 completion estimate.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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