Porous Structure of Pharmaceutical Tablets Studied Using PGSTE-NMR Technique

The compaction of pharmaceutical tablets at high pressure (250 MPa) is a complex process that depends on the nature of the chemical compound. The purpose of this work is to characterize the porous structure of tablets obtained by uniaxial compaction, the most used process in pharmaceutical technology. First, three pharmaceutical excipients (microcrystalline cellulose, lactose and anhydrous calcium phosphate) were compacted and their compressibility properties determined. Secondly, the study of the self-diffusion process of a molecular fluid inside the pore space was performed by using pulsed-gradient stimulated-echo (PGSTE) NMR method, for tablets compacted under various pressure, in the directions perpendicular and parallel to the compaction axis. The results are used to determine the tortuosity factor and the anisotropy of the porous space of such compacted materials.