Pharmaceutical
Spray Drying.

Spray drying as an enabling technology for poorly soluble oral drugs is likely to continue to grow as amorphous materials become more established and widely accepted by the industry. However, future and sizable growth is likely to come from its application in biopharmaceuticals such as in the isolation and preparation of peptides, proteins, and monoclonal antibodies. 

The cost and throughput advantage over traditional lyophilization and the ability to deal with far more complex formulations and solvent systems is likely to drive its gradual introduction in these fields. Aseptic spray dryer is still in the early stage of implementation but robust steps have recently been undertaken in the design of these units as well as in aseptic powder filling, a complementing unit operation. Another area of potential growth is the use of spray drying to produce inhalable drugs; one of the major drawbacks associated with conventional lactose blends is the need to balance adhesive-cohesive forces between the drug substance and the carrier, with a significant amount of drug not detaching from the lactose and being inevitably deposited in the mouth/throat; spray drying, as a continuous process, can be used to overcome this challenge by enabling the preparation of composite particles where, via a precise fine-tuning of particle size distribution during development (and tight control during manufacturing), very high and reproducible respirale fractions can be obtained. Furthermore, spray drying has shown promising results in improving drug bioavailability for poorly water-soluble drugs, making it a valuable technique for future pharmaceutical applications, particularly in addressing the issue of poor bioavailability.