Role of solvents in improvement of dissolution rate of drugs: crystal habit and crystal agglomeration

Impact of Crystal Habit on Solubility of Ticagrelor

Drugs with poor biopharmaceutical performance are the main obstacle to the development and design of medicinal preparations. The anisotropic surface chemistry of different surfaces on the crystal influences its physical and chemical properties, such as solubility, tableting, etc. In this study, the antisolvent crystallization and rapid-cooling crystallization were carried out to tune the crystal habits of ticagrelor (TICA) form II. Different crystal habits of ticagrelor (TICA) form II (TICA-A, TICA-B, TICA-C, TICA-D, and TICA-E) were prepared and evaluated for solubility. The single-crystal diffraction (SXRD) indicated that TICA form II belongs to the triclinic P1 space group with four TICA molecules in the asymmetric unit. The TICA molecules are generated through intermolecular hydrogen bonds along the (010) direction, forming an infinite molecular chain, which are further stacked by hydrogen bonds between hydroxyethoxy side chains, forming molecular circles composed of six TICA molecules along bc directions. Thus, in the case of TICA form II, hydrogen bonds drive growth along one axis (b-axis), which results in the formation of mostly needle-shape crystals. Morphology and face indexation reveals that (001), (010) and (01-1) are the main crystal planes. Powder diffractions showed that five habits have the same crystal structure and different relative intensity of diffraction peak. The solubility of the obtained crystals showed the crystal habits affect their solubility. This work is helpful for studying the mechanism of crystal habit modification and its effect on solubility.

Engineering Cocrystals of PoorlyWater-Soluble Drugs to Enhance Dissolution in Aqueous Medium

Biopharmaceutics Classification System (BCS) Class II and IV drugs suffer from poor aqueous solubility and hence low bioavailability. Most of these drugs are hydrophobic and cannot be developed into a pharmaceutical formulation due to their poor aqueous solubility. One of the ways to enhance the aqueous solubility of poorlywater-soluble drugs is to use the principles of crystal engineering to formulate cocrystals of these molecules with water-soluble molecules (which are generally called coformers). Many researchers have shown that the cocrystals significantly enhance the aqueous solubility of poorly water-soluble drugs. In this review, we present a consolidated account of reports available in the literature related to the cocrystallization of poorly water-soluble drugs. The current practice to formulate new drug cocrystals with enhanced solubility involves a lot of empiricism. Therefore, in this work, attempts have been made to understand a general framework involved in successful (and unsuccessful) cocrystallization events which can yield different solid forms such as cocrystals, cocrystal polymorphs, cocrystal hydrates/solvates, salts, coamorphous solids, eutectics and solid solutions. The rationale behind screening suitable coformers for cocrystallization has been explained based on the rules of five i.e., hydrogen bonding, halogen bonding (and in general non-covalent bonding), length of carbon chain, molecular recognition points and coformer aqueous solubility. Different techniques to screen coformers for effective cocrystallization and methods to synthesize cocrystals have been discussed. Recent advances in technologies for continuous and solvent-free production of cocrystals have also been discussed. Furthermore, mechanisms involved in solubilization of these solid forms and the parameters influencing dissolution and stability of specific solid forms have been discussed. Overall, this review provides a consolidated account of the rationale for design of cocrystals, past efforts, recent developments and future perspectives for cocrystallization research which will be extremely useful for researchers working in pharmaceutical formulation development.

Spherical crystallization: A technique use to reform solubility and flow property of active pharmaceutical ingredients

Tablets have been choice of manufacturers over the years due to their comparatively low cost of manufacturing, packaging, shipping, and ease of administration; also have better stability and can be considered virtually tamper proof. A major challenge in formulation development of the tablets extends from lower solubility of the active agent to the elaborated manufacturing procedures for obtaining a compressible granular material. Moreover, the validation and documentation increases, as the numbers of steps increases for an industrially acceptable granulation process. Spherical crystallization (SC) is a promising technique, which encompass the crystallization, agglomeration, and spheronization phenomenon in a single step. Initially, two methods, spherical agglomeration, and emulsion solvent diffusion, were suggested to get a desired result. Later on, the introduction of modified methods such as crystallo-co-agglomeration, ammonia diffusion system, and neutralization techniques overcame the limitations of the older techniques. Under controlled conditions such as solvent composition, mixing rate and temperature, spherical dense agglomerates cluster from particles. Application of the SC technique includes production of compacted spherical particles of drug having improved uniformity in shape and size of particles, good bulk density, better flow properties as well as better solubility so SC when used on commercial scale will bring down the production costs of pharmaceutical tablet and will increase revenue for the pharmaceutical industries in the competitive market. This review summarizes the technologies available for SC and also suggests the parameters for evaluation of a viable product.