Hot melt extrusion offers pharma process advance
26 Jan 2010
Stuttgart, Germany – Hot melt extrusion process has recently been rapidly gaining in importance as a means of producing pharmaceuticals by continuously disperse and mix active ingredients with carrier substances. The process offers improved processing of substances of low solubility and better product quality while retaining optimum reproducibility, and high economic efficiency.
In response, Coperion is staging a congress on “Pharmaceutical Hot Melt Extrusion” at its headquarters in Stuttgart on 15 April to provide an overview of the opportunities and challenges in the field of continuous hot melt extrusion as a process for the production of pharmaceutical masses. The congress, it said, will also offer a platform for the exchange of know-how and experience between science and industry.
According to the equipment maker, pharmaceutical experts from both science and industry will be speaking at the congress on the present challenges and opportunities of hot melt extrusion and illustrating their lectures with case studies and reports.
Among the presenters, Dr. Jörg Breitenbach of Soliqs, the drug delivery division of Abbott, will be reporting on the “Meltrex” project, which has enabled conversion of the existing production process to hot melt extrusion for the production of tablets instead of gel capsules. The decisive benefits for the patient are manifold: he or she can now reduce their daily consumption to four tablets instead of six capsules, the tablets do not have to be kept in a refrigerator and they do not necessarily have to be taken at mealtimes.
Dr. Iris Ziegler, Nycomed, will explain the application potential of the hot melt extrusion process in the pharmaceutical industry, including the use of co-extrusion and the shaping possibilities. A lecture to be delivered by Dr. Tim Bee, International Specialty Products, will, meanwhile, focus on solid dispersion technology for solubility enhancement including screening techniques, stability, selection of excipients, and final dosage formulation.
The processing and application potential of the hot melt extrusion process will also be the focal point of the lectures given by representatives of scientific research institutes. Prof. Dr. Johannes Khinast, Institute of Process and Particle Engineering of the Graz University of Technology, will be presenting a development project undertaken jointly with Coperion. Prof. Dr. Peter Kleinebudde, Institute of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics, Düsseldorf, and Prof.
Dr. Felix Ecker, Faculty of Pharmaceutics, Fulda, will be reporting on practice-oriented developments and current trends as the results of research.
