The aim of this research was to investigate the driving force of membrane transport through size-exclusion membranes and to provide a concentration-based mathematical description of it to evaluate whether it can be an alternative for lipophilic membranes in the formulation development of amorphous solid dispersions. Carvedilol, an antihypertensive drug, was chosen and formulated using solvent-based electrospinning to overcome the poor water solubility of the drug. Vinylpyrrolidone-vinyl acetate copolymer (PVPVA64) and Soluplus were used to create two different amorphous solid dispersions of the API. The load-dependent effect of the additives on dissolution and permeation through regenerated cellulose membrane was observed by a side-by-side diffusion cell, μFLUX. The solubilizing effect of the polymers was studied by carrying out thermodynamic solubility assays. The supersaturation ratio (SSR, defined as the ratio of dissolved amount of the drug to its thermodynamic solubility measured in exactly the same medium) was found to be the driving force of membrane transport in the case of size-exclusion membranes. Although the transport through lipophilic and size-exclusion membranes is mechanistically different, in both cases, the driving force of membrane transport in the presence of polymer additives was found to be the same. This finding may enable the use of size-exclusion membranes as an alternative to lipid membranes in formulation development of amorphous solid dispersions.
The aim of this study was to draw attention to the challenges of solubility measurement and to present new techniques and detection methods that provide more accurate results. Therefore we...
The work aimed to develop the Absorption Driven Drug Formulation (ADDF) concept, which is a new approach in formulation development to ensure that the drug product meets the expected absorption rate. The concept is built on the solubility-permeability interplay and the rate of supersaturation as the driving force of absorption. This paper presents the first case study using the ADDF concept where not only dissolution and solubility but also permeation of the drug is considered in every step of the formulation development. For that reason, parallel artificial membrane permeability assay (PAMPA) was used for excipient selection, small volume dissolution-permeation apparatus was used for testing amorphous solid dispersions (ASDs), and large volume dissolution-permeation tests were carried out to characterize the final dosage forms. The API-excipient interaction studies on PAMPA indicated differences when different fillers or surfactants were studied. These differences were then confirmed with small volume dissolution-permeation assays where the addition of Tween 80 to the ASDs decreased the flux dramatically. Also, the early indication of sorbitol’s advantage over mannitol by PAMPA has been confirmed in the investigation of the final dosage forms by large-scale dissolution-permeation tests. This difference between the fillers was observed in vivo as well. The presented case study demonstrated that the ADDF concept opens a new perspective in generic formulation development using fast and cost-effective flux-based screening methods in order to meet the bioequivalence criteria.
Creating supersaturating drug delivery systems to overcome the poor aqueous solubility of active ingredients became a frequent choice for formulation scientists. Supersaturation as a solution phenomenon is, however, still challenging to understand, and therefore many recent publications focus on this topic. This work aimed to investigate and better understand the pH dependence of supersaturation of telmisartan (TEL) at a molecular level and find a connection between the physicochemical properties of the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) and the ability to form supersaturated solutions of the API. Therefore, the main focus of the work was the pH-dependent thermodynamic and kinetic solubility of the model API, TEL. Based on kinetic solubility results, TEL was observed to form a supersaturated solution only in the pH range 3–8. The experimental thermodynamic solubility-pH profile shows a slight deviation from the theoretical Henderson–Hasselbalch curve, which indicates the presence of zwitterionic aggregates in the solution. Based on pKa values and the refined solubility constants and distribution of macrospecies, the pH range where high supersaturation-capacity is observed is the same where the zwitterionic form of TEL is present. The existence of zwitterionic aggregation was confirmed experimentally in the pH range of 3 to 8 by mass spectrometry.
Particle size reduction is a commonly used process to improve the solubility and the dissolution of drug formulations. The solubility of a drug in the gastrointestinal tract is a crucial parameter, because it can greatly influence the bioavailability. This work provides a comprehensive investigation of the effect of the particle size, pH, biorelevant media and polymers (PVA and PVPK-25) on the solubility and dissolution of drug formulations using three model compounds with different acid-base characteristics (papaverine hydrochloride, furosemide and niflumic acid). It was demonstrated that micronization does not change the equilibrium solubility of a drug, but it results in a faster dissolution. In contrast, nanonization can improve the equilibrium solubility of a drug, but the selection of the appropriate excipient used for nanonization is essential, because out of the two used polymers, only the PVPK-25 had an increasing effect on the solubility. This phenomenon can be explained by the molecular structure of the excipients. Based on laser diffraction measurements, PVPK-25 could also inhibit the aggregation of the particles more effectively than PVA, but none of the polymers could hold the nanonized samples in the submicron range until the end of the measurements.
Solubility and permeability are key parameters for establishing in vitro-in vivo correlation for poorly water-soluble active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). Recent studies demonstrate that not only solubility, but also effective permeability of the API may change due to the addition of solubilizing agents, and there is a certain mathematical relation between these physicochemical parameters. The aim of this study was to show the importance of early screening of solubility and permeability in presence of additives in order to achieve the expected bioavailability of the API. In this work, the effect of surfactants and microenvironmental pH modifiers were in focus, and pimobendan was chosen as model drug.In the case of pH modifiers, the equilibrium solubility of the API increased, while the permeability decreased significantly. No negative effect was observed for two surfactants at low additive levels, but these two additives also exhibited a slightly negative effect on permeability when used at higher concentrations. In the simultaneous dissolution-permeation studies the surfactants-containing formulation was found to have slightly higher flux than the pH-modifier-containing one. It can be due to the phenomenon that the dissolution of the active substance can be enhanced by these surfactants without any significant permeability reducing effect.The results obtained from the present study clearly demonstrate the importance of studying drug-additive interactions in every step of formulation development and based on these, the selection of the appropriate quality and quantity of additives. In addition, the results also underline the significance of performing simultaneous dissolution-permeation studies to predict bioavailability.
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