Department of Pharmaceutical Analysis

Alexander Ryckaert

Laboratory of Pharmaceutical Process Analytical TechnologyAlexander Ryckaert

Ottergemsesteenweg 460
B-9000 Gent (Belgium)
Tel.: +32-9-264.80.39
Fax: +32-9-222.82.36
E-mail:
Education: Pharmacist (Master in Drug Development)

 

The interest in continuous manufacturing has steadily increased in the pharmaceutical industry. This interest is due to the many advantages in terms of process efficiency, cost reduction, flexibility and environmental footprint reduction that are offered by continuous manufacturing. Therefore, a switch from the current batch processing towards continuous manufacturing is desirable.
A continuous 'from-powder-to-tablet' manufacturing line (i.e. ConsiGma™) with a twin screw wet granulation process as intermediate step is used for this study. The different aspects (i.e. feeding, granulation, drying, milling and tabletting) of the continuous line are studied.
The main goals of this research project are:

  • To evaluate the feeding of a poorly flowable powder
  • To investigate the influence of raw material properties on the critical quality attributes of granules
  • To investigate the influence of process parameters on the critical quality attributes of granules and tablets
  • To enhance the understanding of the twin screw wet granulation process
  • To enhance the understanding of the six-segmented fluid bed dryer of the ConsiGma™-25 system