Jean François Chatal

Professor Jean-François Chatal is a Distinguished Professor of Nuclear Medicine at the University of Nantes, France. He has written 203 original papers and presented more than 150 invited lectures in his career, which began with the creation of a research team devoted to diagnostic and therapeutic use of radiolabeled monoclonal antibodies in oncology. He served as head of Nuclear Medicine Departments at the University Hospital and Cancer Centre in Nantes France. Jean-François’s collaboration with Immunotech in Marseille saw the preclinical and clinical application of an original and innovative pretargeting technology based on the use of unlabeled bispecific antibody and radiolabeled bivalent hapten, which led to a 2006 paper published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology that reported, for the first time, a survival benefit of pretargeted radioimmunotherapy in an advanced solid tumor (medullary thyroid carcinoma). With two colleagues at the University of Nantes, Jean-François initiated the installation of a high energy/high-intensity cyclotron, termed ARRONAX, for the production of innovative radionuclides for nuclear medicine. He also contributed to the creation of Atlab-Pharma, a company dedicated to the industrial development of radiolabeled antibodies for radioimmunotherapy. In 2013, he was honored in Paris by the “Antoine Beclere medal” granted for his work in Nuclear Medicine development.