Awarding of the ISPE DACH Support Prize 2013 for outstanding work in pharmaceutical technology to two doctoral students from the University of Hamburg - Department of Pharmaceutical Technologies.

The two award winners, Pharmacist Anna Novikova and Pharmacist Marten Klukkert.

For outstanding achievements and work in the field of pharmaceutical technologies (Galenic and manufacturing), the ISPE Dach awards endowed study prizes to students and doctoral candidates.

On December 13, 2013, Klaus Thornagel (ISPE) was able to present two prizes at the annual celebration of the Department of Chemistry (University of Hamburg) to the two award winners: Pharmacist Anna Novikova for her work “UV Imaging for the analysis of MUPS tablets: Pellet distribution” and Pharmacist Marten Klukkert for his work “High-Throughput Quality Control of Critical Physical Tablet Attributes by UV Multispectral Imaging.” The work is supervised by Prof. Claudia Leopold.

In Ms. Novikova's work, the applicability of UV imaging was investigated for determining the critical quality attributes of Multiple Unit Pellet System (MUPS) tablets, focusing on the homogeneity of pellet distribution during the tablet manufacturing process. One of the biggest challenges in manufacturing MUPS tablets is ensuring the homogeneous pellet distribution. In this work, UV imaging combined with a self-written script was established as a possible PAT technology for detecting the uniformity of pellet distribution on the surface.

Mr. Klukkert's study “High-Throughput Quality Control of Critical Physical Tablet Attributes by UV Multispectral Imaging” examines the application of a UV imaging process to determine critical physical parameters of tablets. This study demonstrated that multispectral UV imaging, in terms of information content, measurement speed, and simple sample preparation, is an attractive alternative to the established analytical methods of pharmacopoeias and existing imaging techniques such as NIR imaging. A script was developed during this work for automated quality control of tablets, enabling classification based on parameters such as tablet integrity and density distribution within the tablet.

The prize includes a certificate and a one-year free ISPE Dach membership. The prize is endowed with €500 for each award winner.

The ISPE Dach awards this distinction for particularly practical, innovative thesis work with excellent grades. Each year, up to six students from bachelor's/master's degree programs or diploma courses in Pharmaceutical Technology, Chemical Process Engineering/Chemical Engineering, and Biotechnology at scientific universities from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland are honored.