Mirion has announced a donation to the International Atomic Energy Agency in support of Rays of Hope, the initiative aimed at narrowing the gap in access to cancer diagnosis and treatment in low- and middle-income countries. The Atlanta-based company will provide the SunCHECK Machine radiotherapy quality management software, along with quality assurance tools and training courses.
Sun Nuclear, part of the Mirion Medical group, will deliver the equipment. The software records and tracks quality assurance data for linear accelerators, the machines that produce electron or X-ray beams to target tumours. The associated hardware is used for daily, monthly and annual checks. The donation will go to an IAEA Anchor Centre in sub-Saharan Africa, a linked site, and the Agency’s dosimetry laboratory in Austria.
The agreement was signed in Vienna at the opening ceremony of IDOS, the IAEA International Symposium on Standards, Applications and Quality Assurance in Medical Radiation Dosimetry, held from 5 to 9 October. Before the signing, Jeff Kapatoes, Mirion’s vice president of regulatory, physics and product, outlined Sun Nuclear’s contribution to dosimetry and its work with partners and institutions.
The deal expands the partnership signed between Mirion and the IAEA in September 2025, which formalised the company’s support for the Agency’s radiation safety mission. Margaret Johns, president of Sun Nuclear for radiation oncology, said that rigorous quality assurance gives clinical teams confidence that treatment machines perform as intended.
Rays of Hope was launched in 2022 by IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi. According to the Agency’s latest figures, more than 100 countries have requested support, 20 cancer care facilities have joined as regional Anchor Centres, and donors, including private ones, have contributed more than 90 million euros. Other industry players are also taking part: Varian, a Siemens Healthineers company, has donated a linear accelerator for the Black Lion Hospital in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
For Mirion, the move strengthens its relationship with the IAEA beyond the realm of civil nuclear instrumentation. If the Anchor Centres adopt the software as a standard verification tool, machine performance data could become comparable across facilities in different countries, benefiting training and quality of care.
