# Amorphous Pharmaceutical Product Development Using Containerless Methods

> **NIH NIH R44** · MATERIALS DEVELOPMENT, INC. · 2020 · $493,251

## Abstract

Amorphous Pharmaceutical Product Development Using Containerless Methods
Project Summary
The overall objective of this research is to advance drug discovery through precise
“engineering” of the structure and properties of API-bearing phases. Many emerging drugs
cannot be used in their naturally insoluble crystalline forms or they require crystallization in a
preferred polymorph in order to be active. In some cases amorphous forms made using
conventional methods contain residual crystal nuclei and consequently have short shelf lives.
Control of crystalline phase selection can be difficult to achieve and a detailed understanding of
mechanisms is needed to optimize product yield and quality. The new research will result in an
advanced “platform technology” for drug discovery, synthesis and characterization. The
research will optimize performance of the technology and characterize and document its
performance through benchmarking experiments on a variety of pharmaceutical compounds.
Materials to be investigated will be selected by the research team and provided by collaborating
drug companies and scientific collaborators. The technical objectives are to: (i) Optimize a new
method for rapid drug synthesis and screening, (ii) Identify critical pathways to form amorphous
or select crystalline polymorphs through processing, (iii) Test process parameters in systematic
experiments that control nucleation, crystallization and phase selection in drug and drug-
polymer compositions. Commercialization is being realized through sales of instruments and
sales of drug screening services. Throughout the project the research team is working with
several drug companies and a pre-competitive consortium to develop markets.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9882277
- **Project number:** 5R44GM117701-03
- **Recipient organization:** MATERIALS DEVELOPMENT, INC.
- **Principal Investigator:** Richard Johann Weber
- **Activity code:** R44 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $493,251
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2016-05-01 → 2024-02-28

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9882277

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9882277, Amorphous Pharmaceutical Product Development Using Containerless Methods (5R44GM117701-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9882277. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*