---

The Pharmaceutical Solids Formulation and Processing Consortium of Carnegie Mellon University is a technology-driven scientific research consortium focused on liquid-contacting granular materials.

The Technology of granular materials

• wet granulation
• solids filtration
• drying of particulate powders and agglomerates
• agglomerate disintegration and re-dispersion of primary particles

The Science - getting fluids in, getting fluids out
The PSFP Consortium provides fundamental answers to the key questions:

• How do dry granular materials imbibe multicomponent complex fluids?
• How are fluids removed from wet granular materials?
• How does the state of primary particle aggregation in a granular material influence fluid penetration or removal?

Liquid-contacting granular materials are notoriously difficult to formulate and process.
The Pharmaceutical Solids Formulation and Processing Consortium applies fundamental principles of colloid and interface science and continuum mechanics to solve solid/liquid processing problems. The consortium links Carnegie Mellon engineering and science faculty and graduate student researchers with the research and development staff of pharmaceutical and allied industries that process and deliver liquid-contacting granular materials.

Aligning scientific resources to solve challenging problems for the pharmaceutical industry
Ideally, fundamental material property data should inform product and process design, yet the connection between macroscopic performance and molecular properties is unclear for most solid/liquid systems. Making the best use of molecular property information entails challenging scientific and engineering research problems. These are bedrock problems in pharmaceutical processing, and they require broad experimental and theoretical expertise, of the type offered by the collaborating researchers in the PSFP Consortium and the Carnegie Mellon Center for Complex Fluids Engineering.

Achieving continuity amongst chemical characterization, pharmaceutical formulation and process specification
The consortium focuses on the mesoscopic phenomena that bridge the gap between molecular properties and macroscopic performance. The consortium will offer fundamental knowledge to help member companies forge continuous links from physicochemical characterization of actives, to pre-formulation and final product and process specifications. In doing so, the consortium will help practitioners understand how process decisions propagate through the manufacturing stream to the ultimate delivery application.

A group of highly regarded researchers
Participating faculty, all affiliated with the Center for Complex Fluids Engineering, are well-known internationally for research on complex fluids wetting, particulate processing, colloidal and interfacial phenomena, continuum mechanics, and rheology. They are particularly attuned to multicomponent phenomena in realistic industrial complex fluids:

• Stephen Garoff, Professor of Physics (complex fluid wetting and capillarity)
• Dennis Prieve, Professor of Chemical Engineering (colloidal forces and suspension stabilization/aggregation)
• Todd Przybycien, Professor and Head of Biomedical Engineering (vibrational spectroscopy, biomolecule formulations, freeze drying)
• James Schneider, Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering (surface forces, adhesion and self-assembly)
• Robert Tilton, Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering (polymer and surfactant interfacial phenomena, self-assembly and surface forces)
• Lynn Walker, Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering (complex fluid rheology and sprays)
• Lee White, Professor of Chemical Engineering (continuum mechanics, transport in particle aggregates, filtration)

Working to introduce pharmaceutical processing issues into academic curricula
The industry stands to benefit by hiring students who have studied solid/liquid processing, formulation design, batch processing, and a variety of other issues that are rarely emphasized in academic engineering or science curricula. In parallel with its research mission, the PSFP Consortium will work to introduce these vital concepts into curricula at Carnegie Mellon University and elsewhere, by developing workbooks of sample problems to use in conventional courses, new laboratory exercises, and new courses.

Consortium Membership
Consortium members pay an unrestricted annual fee of $25,000. The Consortium pools these fees to support collaborative Ph.D. student research projects that involve two or more participating faculty advisors.

Membership Benefits

• Influence Research Goals: significant intellectual input into research projects through annual review and planning meetings; opportunities to initiate separate specialized research contracts with participating faculty or to participate as a partner in federally funded research projects
• Research Results: gain access to detailed research results before publication; receive semi-annual research reviews and electronic copies of Ph.D. theses
• Industrial Education: discounted attendance at Center for Complex Fluids Engineering short courses and topical workshops
• Recruiting: extensive access to all graduate students in the CCFE, possibly including research internships in industrial laboratories; facilitation of undergraduate internships
• Consulting: One complementary day of consulting each year
• Information Exchange: workshops and annual meetings provide focused platforms for sharing knowledge that is of common interest yet does not jeopardize sensitive information on proprietary chemistries.
• Impact on Undergraduate Education: support an effort to increase curricular coverage of engineering and science topics that are critical to the pharmaceutical industry. Whether it takes the form of voluntary participation or intellectual encouragement, industrial input to curriculum development is welcome!

For further information, contact

Professor Robert D. Tilton
Department of Chemical Engineering
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
tilton@andrew.cmu.edu
Tel: 412-268-1159
Fax: 412-268-7139