Tom Ruth

Thomas Ruth, PhD, is Emeritus Senior Research Scientist at TRIUMF and Emeritus Senior Scientist at the British Columbia Cancer Research Centre. Dr. Ruth holds Adjunct Professorships in Physics at the University of Victoria and Medicine at the University of British Columbia. He is a leader in the production and application of radioisotopes for research in the physical and biological sciences. He has served on a multitude of national and international committees (USDOE, NAS, IAEA).

He served as Director for the UBC/TRIUMF PET Program (1989-2006) during which time he oversaw the installation of the TR13 (TRIUMF) and a TR19 (BC Cancer Agency) cyclotrons plus 5 PET scanners at UBC.

Dr. Ruth received a Master of Arts in Nuclear Chemistry from the College of William and Mary in Virginia and his Ph.D. in nuclear spectroscopy from Clark University in Massachusetts. He was a Staff Chemist within the Chemistry Department at Brookhaven National Lab working with Drs. Al Wolf and Joanna Fowler from 1976 to 1980. He has published more than 300 peer reviewed papers and book chapters (>15,000 citations).

He is the 2011 recipient of the Michael J. Welch Award from the Society of Nuclear Medicine for his contributions to Radiopharmaceutical Chemistry. In 2015, along with 5 of his colleagues he received NSERC’s Brockhowuse Award for their innovative work in producing 99mTc using medical cyclotrons. In June 2019, he was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. In June 2021, he received the Georg de Hevesy Award for his pioneering work in the field of nuclear medicine from the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Medical Imaging and made a Fellow in the Society of Radiopharmaceutical Sciences.