Development of a novel tablet machine for a tiny amount of powder and evaluation of capping tendency

A novel single punch tablet machine was developed for a tiny amount of powder sample. This tablet machine mainly consists of upper and lower punches, single die, and conical powder feeder equipped with micro-vibrators. By using the powder feeder, mass of discharged powder can be maintained constant even if a tiny amount of powder having poor flowability is used. Motions of both upper and lower punches can be set arbitrarily. Thus, this machine enables us to prepare tablets with a tiny amount of powder sample under the same compression mechanism as conventional rotary tablet machines. Performance of the developed tablet machine was evaluated in a continuous direct tableting using a model powder with poor flowability. Thirty-four tablets (195 mg×34) having acceptable properties can be successfully prepared using no more than 10.0 g of a powder sample. We then proposed a novel in-die evaluation method of capping tendency. A new phase diagram consisting of the elastic recovery energy and the plastic deformation energy was proposed. These energies were calculated from a force-displacement profile, continuously monitored by the developed tablet machine. The results indicate that by using the new diagram the capping tendency of tablets prepared from various model powders can be well discriminated. The developed tablet machine and proposed evaluation method can contribute to a significant cost reduction and speeding up of formulation studies of oral dosage form.