Project description
Making nanosuspension analysis quicker and more affordable
Nanosuspensions are a critical material type found in everything from pharmaceuticals, inks and paints to materials for catalysis, batteries and glass manufacture. The accurate measurement of the dispersed nanoparticles is critical for efficient manufacturing processes and ultimately for the performance of the materials. The EU-funded PAT4Nano project aims to develop tools to enable the continuous, rapid and reliable measurement of nanoparticles to facilitate the more efficient, accurate and less costly manufacture of nanomaterials. New process analytical technologies for the online measurement and analysis of industrially relevant nanoparticles should help increase reliability and repeatability of nanoparticle production and could result in EUR 3.2 million savings in the production per pharmaceutical product.
Objective
PAT4Nano offers an integrated, end user-driven, approach to develop and deploy different, yet complementary particle size measurement technologies for in- and online real-time monitoring. These will quantify particle size distribution and chemical composition in nanosuspensions. With the consortium end user partners (Agfa-Gevaert, Janssen Pharmaceutica, and Johnson Matthey), PAT4Nano will focus on applications in pharmaceuticals, inks/pigments, and materials for catalysis, batteries, and glass manufacture. Continuous, rapid, and reliable real-time data from PAT4Nano tools will provide more comprehensive process information than current offline measurements enabling manufacturers to obtain insights into the fundamental dynamics of nanoparticle-based processes. Furthermore, this information can enable continuous process feedback, opening new opportunities to implement real-time process control and feed-forward loops to correct for process variances, leading to better end product consistency and higher process efficiencies. Multi-PAT solutions, where several complementary measurement methods are combined, together with advanced data processing, will further enhance capability by increasing the information that can be extracted from measurements, extending the application range further. PAT4Nano solutions will improve process control and efficiency, and the quality of nanosuspension products. The increased quantity and quality of the real-time data will enhance the efficiency and quality of nanomaterial production. Increased reliability and repeatability will result in more efficient R&D which can produce savings of €3.2M per nanomaterial pharmaceutical product development, for advanced materials it could bring annual savings of >€3M and help advance sustainability, while for Agfa the PAT4nano tools can facilitate new business opportunities leading to local investments (mostly employment) of ~€15 M within 10 years.
Fields of science
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicinepharmacology and pharmacypharmaceutical drugs
- engineering and technologymaterials engineering
- natural scienceschemical sciencescatalysis
- engineering and technologynanotechnologynano-materials
- natural sciencescomputer and information sciencesdata sciencedata processing
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
RIA - Research and Innovation actionCoordinator
2595 DA Den Haag
Netherlands