OTTAWA - The troubled Chalk River nuclear reactor is poised to resume isotope production after a 15-month hiatus.
Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. says it expects to have the Ontario reactor back up and running this month.
The 53-year-old National Research Universal reactor supplied a third of the world's medical isotopes until AECL shut it down in May 2009.
he shutdown came after scientists found a pinhole-sized radioactive water leak.
What was originally supposed to be a month-long shutdown has dragged on for more than a year.
Doctors have been scrambling to make do with an erratic supply of medical isotopes to diagnose cancer and heart ailments.
