Attenuated total reflection infrared spectroscopy (ATR-IR) as an in situ technique for dissolution studies

USB multiplex analyzer employing screen-printed silver electrodes on paper substrate; A developed design for dissolution testing

Multiplex ion analyzers have been introduced recently for the assay of several inorganic ions, whilst electrochemists have extensively employed screen printed sensors for pharmaceutical analyses. This work aims to develop a USB pluggable sensor with a user-friendly design for multiplex analysis of oppositely charged co-formulated organic ions. The miniaturized screen-printed electrode was developed using silver ink on paper substrate. A compact sensor design was attained by including three electrodes, a single reference electrode along with an indicator electrode for each of the determined ions. Optimized PVC membranes were drop-casted over each of the indicator electrodes for the determination of phenylephrine HCl (PHE) and ibuprofen (IBU). The proposed multiplex potentiometric sensors exhibit Nernstian slopes of 59.2 ± 0.26 and -56.8 ± 0.16 mV/decade for PHE and IBU, respectively, with respective detection limits of 1.6 × 10^-7 and 6.53 × 10^-8 mol L^-1. The fast and stable response of the developed sensor enabled the real-time monitoring of the combined dosage form dissolution. The dissolution profiles obtained by this potentiometric analyzer and an off-line separation technique were compared favourably, albeit our proposed in-line sensor reduced waste and time of analysis. The developed method successfully complies with the most demanding stipulations of green analytical chemistry.

Integrating QbD Tools for Flexible Scale-Up Batch Size Selection for Solid Dosage Forms

The pilot scale batch size for solid oral dosage forms is currently defined by major regulatory agencies as one-tenth of the full production, or 100,000 units, whichever is larger. The current criterion is arbitrary and is not based on scientific and risk assessment principles. The approach does not consider geometric, kinematic, and dynamic changes that come into play on scale-up. Even if this criterion is met, impact of scale-up on critical quality attributes cannot be ruled out and also reproducibility cannot be assured simply by restricting the scale-up size. In keeping with the vision for the 21st Century Good Manufacturing Practice initiative to build quality into the product, it is imperative that the selection of scale-up batch size be based on science and risk assessment principles and be part of the product development program. Scale-up should never be seen as an isolated activity. This article will review various tools that can be integrated with quality by design for flexible batch size selection during scale-up.

Analytical technologies for real-time drug dissolution and precipitation testing on a small scale

Objectives

This review focuses on real-time analytics of drug dissolution and precipitation testing on a comparatively small scale.

Key findings

Miniaturisation of test equipment is an important trend in pharmaceutics, and several small-scale experiments have been reported for drug dissolution and precipitation testing. Such tests typically employ analytics in real-time. Fibre optic ultraviolet (UV) analytics has become a well-established method in this field. Novel imaging techniques are emerging that use visible or UV light; also promising is Fourier transform infrared imaging based on attenuated total reflection. More information than just a rate constant is obtained from these methods. The early phase of a dissolution process can be assessed and drug precipitation may eventually be observed. Some real-time techniques are particularly well suited to studying drug precipitation during formulation dispersion; for example, turbidity, focused beam reflectance measurement and Raman spectroscopy.

Summary

Small-scale dissolution tests equipped with real-time analytics have become important to screen drug candidates as well as to study prototype formulations in early development. Future approaches are likely to combine different analytical techniques including imaging. Miniaturisation started with mini-vessels or small vials and future assays of dissolution research will probably more often reach the level of parallel well plates and microfluidic channels.

Pharmaceutical Applications of Chemometric Techniques

Chemometrics involves application of various statistical methods for drawing vital information from various manufacturing-related processes. Multiway chemometric models like parallel factor analysis (PARAFAC), Tucker-3, N-partial least square (N-PLS), and bilinear models like principle component regression (PCR) and partial least squares (PLS) have been discussed in the paper. Chemometric approaches can be used to analyze the data obtained from various instruments including near infrared (NIR), attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR), high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), and terahertz pulse spectroscopy. The technique has been used in the quality assurance and quality control of pharmaceutical solid dosage forms. Moreover, application of chemometric methods in the evaluation of properties of pharmaceutical powders and tablet parametric tests has also been discussed in the review. It has been suggested as a useful method for the real-time in-process testing and is a valuable process analytical tool.

Monitoring the dissolution of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient and TPGS in real time via IR spectroscopy during the manufacturing of liquid dosage formulation

Infrared spectroscopy is used to monitor the dissolution of the Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API) and an excipient (vitamin E - TPGS) during manufacturing of a liquid pharmaceutical formulation. The goal of the analysis is to explore options for real-time, on screen, and quantitative monitoring of these two components by using an iC10 instrument. As is common, the first step in the approach is to create respective calibration models for the two components and then apply those models on the spectra obtained from scale-up batches. Interestingly, while the API dissolves at the room temperature, TPGS dissolves at an acceptable rate at 50 °C so both temperatures have to be considered. It is shown that univariate models of sufficient accuracy can be developed with a straightforward applicability to the scale-up batches spectra and providing reasonably accurate estimates of the API and TPGS concentrations. Some limitations of the software on the employed instrument may diminish the prospect for the quantitative analysis of the components of interest in this formulation.

Insights into the early dissolution events of amlodipine using UV imaging and Raman spectroscopy

Traditional dissolution testing determines drug release to the bulk, but does not enable an understanding of the events happening close to the surface of a solid or a tablet. UV imaging is a new imaging approach that can be used to study the dissolution behavior of chemical compounds. The UV imaging instrumentation offers recording of absorbance maps with a high spatial and temporal resolution which facilitates the abundant collection of information regarding the evolving solution concentrations. In this study, UV imaging was used to visualize the dissolution behavior of amlodipine besylate (amorphous and dihydrate forms) and amlodipine free base. The dissolution of amlodipine besylate was faster from the amorphous form than from the crystalline forms. The UV imaging investigations suggested that a solvent mediated phase transformation occurred for the amorphous amlodipine besylate and the amlodipine free base samples. Raman spectroscopy was used to confirm and probe the changes at the solid surface occurring upon contact with the dissolution media and verified the recrystallization of the amorphous form to the monohydrate. The combination of UV imaging and Raman spectroscopy is an efficient tool to obtain a deeper insight into the early events of the dissolution process.