• Journal of Radiopharmaceuticals and Molecular Probes
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.9-16
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• 2016

Carbon-11 is one of the most sensitive and desirable positron emission tomography radio-isotope, which offers the capacity to be incorporated, through a covalent bond, into biologically active molecules without altering their biological properties. Carbon-11 can be obtained from the cyclotron with two different chemical forms: $[^{11}C]CO_2$ and $[^{11}C]CH_4$. [$^{11}C$]Methyl iodide has been widely used as a highly reactive labelling precursor that can be applied to label carbon-11 with biologically active molecules via alkylation of N-, O-, or S-nucleophiles. A more recent and still challenging labeling method is transition metal mediated $^{11}C$-carbonylation. Advances in organic chemistry, radiochemistry and improved automated techniques greatly encourage researchers to develop more carbon-11 labelled radiotracers for molecular imaging studies. This mini-review will introduce a historical track of carbon-11 chemistry combining with examples and its role in near future.