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DuPont Nutrition & Health provides solutions for tablets, capsules, multi-particulates and suspensions to comprehensively improve the delivery of modern medicine with a full range of immediate, delayed, and sustained release options; enhanced bioavailability for novel APIs; and vegetarian alternatives to traditional binders. Through its global facilities and customer collaboration, DuPont Nutrition & Health can target regional consumer needs while providing universal access to life-saving solutions.

This article highlights DuPont’s deep understanding of market trends, regulatory requirements and healthcare technologies that enable it to help solve the toughest challenges for pharmaceutical manufacturers.

Poor water solubility can severely limit a drug compound’s oral bioavailability, interfere with commercial viability and keep potentially promising therapies out of reach of those in need. AFFINISOL™ Polymers are designed to remove the barrier of insolubility and inhibit crystallization of the API. The polymers are compatible with both spray-dried dispersion and hot-melt extrusion formulation processes.

Sustained Release Formulation and process-variable interactions pose a challenge in developing stable, controlled drug delivery tablet and capsule formulations. DuPont products for modified release provide tailored solutions to control the release of APIs in matrices, multi-particulates, osmotic systems and liquid suspensions; and versatility in drug release rates. These market-leading controlled release delivery systems allow formulators to expand their product portfolios and offer patients more convenient ways to manage their medical conditions.

Acid-sensitive drugs designed for intestine targeting can be disintegrated by stomach acid, severely upsetting the stomach if the drug is released there. ENTERACT™ Polymers resist disintegration in the stomach, allowing for the API to release where it should: in the intestine. ENTERACT™ is available in fine grades for aqueous coating and granular for solvent-based coating of multi-particulates, tablets and capsules.

DuPont also offers Aquacoat® CPD, a completely water-based solution that is ideal for acid-sensitive multi-particulate drug delivery systems. Aquacoat® CPD has long been recognized as one of the most trusted enteric coatings in the industry, thanks to its easy application and low viscosity.

Ac-Di-Sol^® croscarmellose sodium is widely used as a disintegrating agent in tablets, capsules, granules and other fast-release preparations. Due to its excellent water absorption and rapid expansion characteristics, the product can show stable disintegration performance, which is a major factor in maximizing bio-availability. For a more sustainable, co-processed option, Avicel® is a co-spray-dried microcrystalline cellulose excipient optimized for the use in dry granulation processes. The ingredient possesses excellent flow and binding properties, and is offered in a variety of enhanced grades designed to boost productivity and meet any formulation challenge.

METHOCEL™ polymers lead to tablet coatings that are proven, robust, printable, economical and highly consistent. Our coatings are micro-thin, non-caloric, non-nutritive, non-allergenic and more resistant to the growth of microorganisms that affect coatings made with gums, sugar and other technologies.

We offer more than 50 years of experience in developing flexible binders that are compatible in wet and dry processes, and produce granulations with good flow and compaction characteristics. METHOCEL™ & POLYOX™ Polymers offer important binding and adhesive properties during the granulation step of the manufacturing process for immediate release tablets. ETHOCEL™ Resins are widely used in solvent-based granulations when an API is sensitive to water.

APIs are inherently bitter tasting, which leads to challenges with patient compliance. Acceptable taste is a prerequisite to successfully introduce new active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) or expand upon existing alternative portfolio ingredients. Dow AMBERLITE™ and DUOLITE™ Resins help release APIs in the stomach instead of the mouth to prevent bitter taste. In addition, water-insoluble ETHOCEL™ Polymers prevent immediate dissolution during ingestion for greater taste-masking functionality.

DuPont technologies are designed to help pharmaceutical formulators and manufacturers streamline production processes and improve cost efficiencies. For example, DuPont coating solutions can reduce coating times by as much as 54 percent and provide improved equipment efficiency. Its family of polymers are also suitable for use in direct compression applications, a process that eliminates wet granulation, reduces waste, shortens development time and lowers manufacturing costs by as much as 60 percent.

In the highly regulated pharmaceutical market, continuous innovation is vital to success. Whether expanding a portfolio with controlled-release medicines, meeting solubilization performance requirements, or making safer tablets that are easier to swallow or extra tough to crush, DuPont Nutrition & Health is up to the task. With products backed by testing, analytics and formulation expertise, DuPont has the necessary solutions to meet today’s toughest health challenges.