Precipitation of Pioglitazone Hydrochloride Microparticles by Supercritical Anti-Solvent (SAS)

The purpose of this research was to evaluate the effects of supercritical precipitation on the physicochemical characteristics of Pioglitazone hydrochloride (PG). Therefore, PG powder was dissolved in methanol, ethanol, acetone, dichloromethane and binary mixtures of these solvents and the solutions were sprayed into the supercritical carbon dioxide. The processed powders were harvested then analyzed by using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), differential scanning calorimetery (DSC) and Infrared Spectroscopy (IR) methods. Different morphologies of PG particles were observed in the SEM micrographs and the particle sizes varied between 37.1 µm and 95.1 µm. The IR spectroscopy showed no changes in molecular structure of drug during the process. Also, the DSC thermograms confirmed the similar thermal behavior of PG before and after processing. The dissolution rate of unprocessed and processed powders was compared and showed enhancement in the dissolution rate of processed powders up to 2 times.