Nanocrystallization confined to porous matrices with and without surface functionalization effects

Poorly water-soluble active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), which represent a major fraction of the molecules in drug discovery and development, are a challenge to the pharmaceutical industry given their low bioavailability. One way to address this issue is to generate nanocrystals of these APIs. Nanocrystals have a significantly increased surface area to volume ratio as compared to standard micron-sized crystals, which results in improved solubility and dissolution rates. There already exist some industrially relevant techniques for producing pharmaceutical nanocrystals, which typically exploit contact forces and high pressures to bring crystals of a normal micron range down to the nanocrystal scale. However, these techniques are often plagued with challenges such as low production rates, high energy input, and issues with stabilization and control over the final crystalline form produced.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctoral

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Chemical Engineering

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2018

Author dc:creator

• Dwyer, Leia M.(Leia Mary)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Allan S. Myerson.

• Chemical Engineering.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/121705

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/121705