scholarly journals Improvement of a 1D Population Balance Model for Twin-Screw Wet Granulation by Using Identifiability Analysis

Pharmaceutics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 692
Author(s):  
Ana Alejandra Barrera Jiménez ◽  
Daan Van Hauwermeiren ◽  
Michiel Peeters ◽  
Thomas De Beer ◽  
Ingmar Nopens

Recently, the pharmaceutical industry has undergone changes in the production of solid oral dosages from traditional inefficient and expensive batch production to continuous manufacturing. The latest advancements include increased use of continuous twin-screw wet granulation and application of advanced modeling tools such as Population Balance Models (PBMs). However, improved understanding of the physical process within the granulator and improvement of current population balance models are necessary for the continuous production process to be successful in practice. In this study, an existing compartmental one-dimensional PBM of a twin-screw granulation process was improved by altering the original aggregation kernel in the wetting zone as a result of an identifiability analysis. In addition, a strategy was successfully applied to reduce the number of model parameters to be calibrated in both the wetting zone and kneading zones. It was found that the new aggregation kernel in the wetting zone is capable of reproducing the particle size distribution that is experimentally observed at different process conditions as well as different types of formulations, varying in hydrophilicity and API concentration. Finally, it was observed that model parameters could be linked not only to the material properties but also to the liquid to solid ratio, paving the way to create a generic PBM to predict the particle size distribution of a new formulation.

Processes ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 1027
Author(s):  
Lianghui Xu ◽  
Xianglin Zhou ◽  
Jinghao Li ◽  
Yunfei Hu ◽  
Hang Qi ◽  
...  

In this work, an atomizer with a de Laval-type nozzle is designed and studied by commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software, and the secondary breakup process during atomization is simulated by two-way coupling and the discrete particle model (DPM) using the Euler-Lagrange method. The simulation result demonstrates that the gas flow patterns greatly change with the introduction of liquid droplets, which clearly indicates that the mass loading effect is quite significant as a result of the gas-droplet interactions. An hourglass shape of the cloud of disintegrating molten metal particles is observed by using a stochastic tracking model. Finally, this simulation approach is used for the quantitative evaluation of the effects of altering the atomizing process conditions (gas-to-melt ratio, operating pressure P, and operating gas temperature T) and nozzle geometry (protrusion length h, half-taper angle α, and gas slit nozzle diameter D) on the particle size distribution of the powders produced.


2010 ◽  
Vol 2010 ◽  
pp. 1-7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Linjing Zhu ◽  
Hongqiao Lan ◽  
Bingjing He ◽  
Wei Hong ◽  
Jun Li

Encapsulation of menthol in beeswax was prepared by a modified particles from gas-saturated solutions (PGSS) process with controlling the gas-saturated solution flow rate. Menthol/beeswax particles with size in the range of 2–50 μm were produced. The effects of the process conditions, namely, the pre-expansion pressure, pre-expansion temperature, gas-saturated solution flow rate, and menthol composition, on the particle size, particle size distribution, and menthol encapsulation rate were investigated. Results indicated that in the range of studied conditions, increase of the pressure, decrease of the gas-saturated solution flow rate, and decrease of the menthol mass fraction can decrease the particle size and narrow particle size distribution of the produced menthol/beeswax microparticles. An N2-blowing method was proposed to measure the menthol release from the menthol/beeswax microparticles. Results showed that the microparticles have obvious protection of menthol from its volatilization loss.


2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (02) ◽  
pp. 1440001 ◽  
Author(s):  
AIXIANG XU ◽  
ZHIQIANG LIU ◽  
TENGLEI ZHAO ◽  
XIAOXIAO WANG

Particle size distribution and number of ice crystals have a great influence on the flow and heat transfer performance of ice slurry. A population balance model (PBM) containing population and mass balances has been built to simulate numerically the development of ice particle size distribution during adiabatic ice slurry storage. The model assumes a homogeneously mixed and long-term storage tank in which the effect of breakage and aggregation between ice crystals was considered. For solving the population balance equations (PBEs) in the PBM, a semi-discrete finite volume scheme was applied. Finally, the effect of breakage and aggregation on development of ice particle size distribution was analyzed respectively. The results show that both breakage and aggregation are the two important effects on the particle size distribution and evolution of ice particle during storage, but they have opposite effect on the development of ice crystal size. In storage, breakage and aggregation have almost equivalent effect in the initial phase, but aggregation has dominant effect at last. The PBM results are in good agreement with experimental results by Pronk et al. [Effect of long-term ice slurry storage on crystal size distribution, 5th Workshop on Ice Slurries of the IIR (2002), pp. 151–160]. Therefore, the PBM presented in this paper is able to predict the development of particle size distribution during ice slurry storage.


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