Partnership with Knowledge Gain – on Both Sides

The Institute of Particle Technology (iPAT) at the Technical University of Braunschweig deals with particulate solids (see box for details). Since the focus is not only on research into engineering and scientific principles, but also on applied sciences, industrial conditions are of great interest.

Enriching cooperation

The first points of contact with KORSCH were practical: “My first contact with tableting was also my first contact with KORSCH,” says Dr Jan Henrik Finke, Head of the “Pharma- and Bioparticle Technology” research department. A tableting course organized by the Working Group for Pharmaceutical Process Engineering (APV) provided the framework for an intensive, discussion-oriented exchange and marked the beginning of the collaboration. Today, the cooperation is enriching for everyone involved, because: “We learn about the industrial challenges and can set the right focus – which can later be transferred to the business processes,” explains the head of division.

This is why the projects on production and further processing in the context of tableting in Finke‘s research field combine the expertise of the institute with that of the companies involved. In addition to these interactions with practice, the methodology of model development also guides the research. The scientist and his team are working on “explaining the complex processes building block by building block, moving away from an empirical approach towards a physical understanding.” In this way, causal chains can be formed and developments made predictable – such as the interactions between the powder particles.

The propulsive whole

Two aspects in particular connect the Braunschweig pharmaceutical scientists and the specialists for tableting technologies, KORSCH and MEDELPHARM: the exchange of knowledge and the use of the equipment. iPAT works with the aim of researching the relationships and conditions for tableting, while KORSCH and MEDELPHARM are familiar with the global needs of the industry, on the basis of which they are constantly developing their product lines. “We form a propulsive whole that is supported by our different core competencies,” says Finke, describing the partnership.

Not only in terms of equipment: on the one hand, it is part of various study programs, such as the KORSCH XL 100 laboratory rotary press, which has been stationed in Braunschweig since 2014. The equipment in the Berlin INNOVATION CENTER is also regularly used by iPAT‘s young scientists. This is particularly effective, explains the head of research, “because our students can receive direct support from the KORSCH experts on the machines.” On the other hand, iPAT‘s particle technology work would be inconceivable without the tableting technologies from KORSCH and MEDELPHARM. The equipment is currently being used in two of the institute‘s projects, both funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).

Current research work

The “STRAP” project, which is investigating the effects of different formulations on the tableting process, brings together the expertise of the universities of Braunschweig and Bordeaux, thus underlining the Franco-German axis of the two tableting specialists. Another project at iPAT on the topic of “Die filling in rotary tablet presses” aims to gain an in-depth understanding of the process, as completeness and consistency in tableting are crucial to quality, particularly in the pharmaceutical industry. The research team is therefore modeling the influences of material and machine parameters on the filling results of different flowing powders – in order to make quantitative predictions.

Science and practice benefit from each other

The iPAT, KORSCH and MEDELPHARM are not simply cooperating; the three are linked by a long-standing, active partnership with shared knowledge: For Dr Friederike Gütter, process specialist at KORSCH‘s Berlin INNOVATION CENTER, it is above all the scientifically based results that make the collaboration unique: “Our experts know the machines and have a lot of know-how and experience, which they translate into machine configurations. But the material properties that lead to good flowability and tablet quality during production on a specific tablet press model are not found anywhere in the specialist literature, and this is where we benefit from the knowledge built up at iPAT.”

KORSCH process specialist Dr Moritz Rosch adds: “A research facility like iPAT can go into even more depth than we can when it comes to finding solutions for customers. In reverse, we can support research with our expertise and our instruments.” Jan Henrik Finke is inspired by the fact that “a free, creative spirit of research meets the best machines” – and as a scientist, he is always thrilled “when a research idea is implemented in a machine or industrial application in such a way that it works even better”.

The “STRAP” Project - Scale Transfer in Pharmaceutical compression – from compaction simulators to rotary presses

The project is being carried out as a cooperation between the Institute for Particle Technology (iPAT) at the Technical University of Braunschweig and the Institut Mécanique et d’Ingénierie (I2M) at the University of Bordeaux. The project is managed by Dr Jan Hendrik Finke in Braunschweig and Dr Vincent Mazel in Bordeaux. STRAP investigates the effects of different formulations on the overall process on the Styl’One Evo compaction simulator and the XL 100.

To this end, the Franco-German team is focusing on the two quality-determining sub-processes “filling” and “compacting” on rotary presses. The iPAT is researching the material behavior during die filling on the compacting simulator and its transfer to the rotary press, while the I2M is focusing on the compaction process and the reproducibility of tableting errors.

After the separate analyses, the results are correlated in order to derive a reliable prediction of process parameters and correlated product properties on industrial machine scales.

The Institute for Particle Technology at the Technical University of Braunschweig (iPAT)

iPAT investigates the production, handling, formulation, and processing of particulate solids and researches their underlying physical and chemical relationships. These complex tasks are dealt with on an interdisciplinary basis: Engineers from various disciplines work hand in hand with natural scientists; cooperation with industry is also a conceptual component of all projects.

About Jan Henrik Finke

Jan Henrik Finke completed his PhD in 2014 on the topic of “Manufacturing colloidal drug delivery systems in customized microsystems: Characterization of process efficiency and interactions”. Since 2017, he has headed the research area “Pharmaceutical and Bioparticle Technology” at iPAT. In addition, he has been a Senior Scientist at the Fraunhofer Institute for Surface Engineering and Thin Films in Braunschweig since 2020; at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, he temporarily held the deputy professorship for “Pharmaceutical Technology”.