“Filling the Gap” in Continuous Pharmaceutical Technologies: A Novel Continuous Filtration Drying System

In recent years, the world’s top pharmaceutical companies have started major research programs to switch from classical batch to continuous manufacturing of their active drug substances. There is a significant gap in technology for the continuous isolation. Alconbury Weston Ltd (AWL), a leading supplier of continuous crystallization and filtration equipment, has designed an innovative continuous carousel filter dryer (CCFD) which filters, washes and dries solids in small aliquots simultaneously in a continuous manner.

The core technology is based on well-established Nutsche filtration, processing thin cakes in a fully automated system. A state-of-the-art vision system can be used to track the cake and liquid heights during filtration and washing, improving product purity, yields and quality attributes. The CCFD is a complete plant which replaces a traditional batch production facility and fits into a walk-in fume cupboard.

The presentation will describe the challenges and issues observed in batch filtration systems and demonstrate how these challenges can be addressed using continuous filtration. The talk will demonstrate the collaborative efforts required for the development of a novel continuous processing technology through to a commercial product. AWL has worked with Strathclyde University and CMAC (Glasgow, UK) and Purdue University (Indiana, US) to investigate the advantages of continuous filtration. The presentation will include case studies carried out at both academic centres of excellence.