Advances in Raman Spectroscopy in Pharmaceutical Analysis

Federation of Analytical Chemistry and Spectroscopy Societies (FACSS), the Joint Pharmaceutical Analysis Group (JPAG), the Royal Society of Chemistry Molecular Spectroscopy Group (MSG) and the Infrared & Raman Discussion Group (IRDG):

Advances in Raman Spectroscopy in Pharmaceutical Analysis

Advances in Raman Spectroscopy in Pharmaceutical Analysis was the subject of a very successful symposium held at the Royal Society of Chemistry, Burlington House, London, on Thursday 17 May 2012. The meeting was jointly organised by the Federation of Analytical Chemistry and Spectroscopy Societies (FACSS), the Joint Pharmaceutical Analysis Group (JPAG), the Royal Society of Chemistry Molecular Spectroscopy Group (MSG) and the Infrared & Raman Discussion Group (IRDG), and was the first time that FACSS had been involved in organising a meeting in Europe.

Raman spectroscopy has found favour in pharmaceutical analysis because it is non-destructive, requires minimal sample preparation and gives clear spectra for identification. The programme demonstrated a breadth of successful Raman applications spanning the R&D field, active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) development, scale-up and manufacturing, as well as drug product formulation development, characterisation and product assay. The topics covered are briefly reviewed below.

Characterising amorphous and crystalline forms of APIs is one area in which Raman spectroscopy can be used whether for monitoring transformations or salt to free form conversion. Raman methods can also be moved from the development site to in-line methods at a manufacturing site. One exciting new application is the joining of Raman spectroscopy to an image analyser to measure not only the chemistry of individual particles, but also their size and shape to use the information to improve product uniformity and performance, as well as a more informed optimization of the drug product manufacturing process. However, conventional Raman microscopy can still be used to identify components of solid dosage forms and its use to reverse engineer pharmaceutical tablets was well demonstrated.

Removing the effects of packaging to identify raw materials with Spatially Offset Raman Spectroscopy [SORS] is a novel Raman concept permitting unobstructed probing of unopened translucent packaging in raw materials testing. It gives a wider range of packaging accessible than with conventional Raman spectroscopy with faster and more cost effective materials testing.

Transmission Raman spectroscopy was shown to be the way forward in many applications for the identification of polymorphs with high accuracy and low levels of quantification compared to backscattering methods. Finally, new hand-held Raman instruments were compared with conventional laboratory based instruments. What you gain is rapidity, mobility, ease of use and on the spot identifications at the expense of low spectral quality, higher fluorescence and less Raman scattering.

The meeting also included a Vendor’s Showcase of 5-minute presentations each and a poster session at which various posters were judged for this year’s RSC MSG Duncan Bryant Prize for the best poster, awarded to Miss Rajni Miglani of Strathclyde University (a copy of the poster is attached below).

RSC MSG committee member, John Chalmers, presenting the Duncan Bryant Prize to Rajni Miglani of the Institute of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences, University of Strathclyde.

The speakers and organisers of the meeting.

The speakers included presenters from France, Ireland, the UK and the USA. The oral technical presentations were:

Characterising amorphous and crystalline forms of APIs

Dr Lynne Taylor, Purdue University, W. Lafayette, IN, USA

Moving PAT from laboratory to production and getting FDA approval

Dr John Wasylyk, Bristol-Myers Squibb, New Brunswick, NJ, USA

Raman spectral imaging to characterise individual particles

Dr Justin Pritchard, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Cambridge, MA, USA

Removing the effects of packaging to identify raw materials with Spatially Offset Raman Spectroscopy [SORS]

Dr Pavel Matousek, Rutherford Appleton Laboratories, Harwell, Oxfordshire, UK

Reverse engineering studies with Raman imaging to defend patents

Dr Nisha Mistry, GSK, Stevenage, UK

Why transmission Raman spectroscopy is the future: case studies

Dr Elisabeth Vey, Ethypharm, France

Comparison of NIR, Raman backscattering and transmission spectroscopy for the analysis of polymorphs

Michelle Hennigan, National University of Ireland Galway, Galway, Ireland

Laboratory vs hand-held instruments: what you gain and what you lose

Dr Sulaf Assi, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, UK