Researchers at the Institute of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics at the University of Dusseldorf in Germany have bought a Near Infrared Chemical Imaging (NIR-CI) system from Malvern Instruments.
The Sapphire system can deliver rapid, robust and flexible spatial and chemical information.
It was selected for its wide sampling dynamic range and depth of field.
The Sapphire system is suitable for analysing curved tablets, whole granules and pellets.
Prof Jorg Breitkreutz and his research team are using the system for testing oral drug-loaded films, also called wafers, in a project designed to tackle the difficulties of administering drugs to young children.
Breitkreutz said: 'Paediatric drug delivery is a major challenge.
'There is currently a lack of suitable and safe solid drug formulations for children and new EU legislation will enforce paediatric clinical trials and drug development.
'Current advances in this area include interesting new drug-delivery concepts such as multi-particulate dosage forms, mini-tablets, fast-dissolving formulations, small-sized oral films and wafers designed to stick to the roof of the patient's mouth.
'However, novel dosage forms often need special methods to assess their properties for both development and quality control, as standard testing procedures are not available in the pharmacopoeias.
'This increases the need for flexible analytical methodology and instrumentation.
'Malvern's near-infrared chemical imaging system accommodates the sample variability encompassed by modern pharmaceutical development and was therefore our ideal solution for visualisation of drug distribution within the dosage forms.' On 29 May 2009 the European Journal of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics published a paper authored by Verena Garsuch and Jorg Breitkreutz.
'Novel Analytical Methods for the Characterisation of Oral Wafers' described a study that aimed to compensate for the lack of adequate methods for the characterisation of the novel wafers by applying advanced analytical techniques.
The Malvern chemical imaging system plays a critical role within the morphological investigation as it can depict visually unrecognised differences in the distribution of the active pharmaceutical ingredient within wafers.
Further information regarding the application of NIR-CI in pharmaceutical development can be found at the company's website.
