Particle surface modification is becoming a vital strategy in the pharmaceutical industry for “difficult to formulate” APIs. Most surface modification techniques, however, alter innate particle properties either chemically or physically. These surface modification technologies involve the use of elevated temperatures, high pressures, and/or solvents, making these processes highly unsuitable for unstable APIs that are degraded when exposed to such conditions. 

Aston Particle Technologies (APT) has developed the world’s first aerosolized dry particle coating technology. This technology is a one-step, ambient temperature process, with controlled processing parameters that can deliver repeatable product performance with commercially available excipients.

The science underpinning this technology requires the use of a high G-force chamber, with a curtain of nitrogen gas to fluidize the powder at the chamber wall, which disperses any agglomerated fine or coarse particles. The co-aerosolization of the particles results in coating of all the fine particles onto the surface of the coarse particles and can produce particles with designed functionalities, even with highly sensitive APIs. These functionalized particles enhance the inherent properties of API without degrading them in any way. There is no exposure to heat/solvent, and the particles suffer no attrition during processing, which is a significant advantage compared with other current state-of-the-art dry coating technologies (1-5).

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