ATR Imaging of Pharmaceutical Tablets

There has been a significant and growing interest in chemical imaging of pharmaceutical tablets in recent years. Technology improvements and increased use has established chemical imaging as a means of providing information on certain critical quality parameters that is not readily addressable using other techniques. In addition to major pharmaceutical manufacturers, generic manufacturers and even regulatory authorities1 now recognize the value of chemical imaging both in troubleshooting in manufacturing and scale-up and in root cause analysis2. Of the various imaging techniques, NIR imaging has probably (and justifiably) received most attention, and is poised to grow further as a PAT-enabling technique3. Other chemical imaging techniques such as Raman and mid-IR diffuse reflectance each have their own merits and disadvantages, but NIR is attractive from the technology, implementation and sampling perspectives. Data generated by this method is also more familiar to many users in this area who might have experience in macro-NIR spectroscopy of tablet ingredients. That said, NIR imaging using current technology (be it FT, tunable or fixed filter) suffers some intrinsic ATR Imaging of Pharmaceutical Tablets A P P L I C