Application of Ultrafine Powder Technology in Traditional Chinese Medicine Preparations
Ultrafine powder technology is a new chemical engineering technology that is currently popular in various countries. It began in the 1970s and has broad development prospects in the pharmaceutical industry. This article introduces the application of ultrafine powder technology in traditional Chinese medicine preparations and analyzes its impact on the quality and process of drug preparations.
At present, powders with a particle size of less than 3μm are called ultrafine powders abroad. Ultrafine powder technology refers to the preparation and use of ultrafine powders and related technologies. The research content includes the preparation, classification, separation, drying, surface modification, particle composite, particle size measurement, safety technology in the manufacturing and storage and transportation process of ultrafine powders. Ultrafine powder technology is also called ultrafine grinding technology and cell-level micro-grinding technology. This is a purely physical process. It can increase the median particle size of animal and plant medicinal powders obtained by traditional grinding technology from about 75 μm to below 5-10 μm. This technology has gradually been widely used in traditional Chinese medicine preparations, especially the use of ultrafine particles of drugs in external medicines, oral medicines and suspension injections. Therefore, the introduction of ultrafine powder technology in the pharmaceutical industry is inevitable for the development of traditional Chinese medicine. However, the use of ultrafine powder technology to micronize drugs will also have a certain impact on the quality of the drugs and the process of drug preparations.
In actual industrial production, the medicinal materials are often pre-treated by coarse grinding using traditional methods, and then further ultra-finely ground after screening to achieve the required particle size specifications (grading). The application of ultra-fine powder technology of traditional Chinese medicine has brought about the innovation and development of traditional Chinese medicine dosage forms, and broadened the dosage forms of crude drugs.
The key to the ultra-fine grinding process is to judge the appropriate grinding force field according to the physical properties of the crude drug, so as to select effective ultra-fine grinding equipment. At present, the ultra-fine grinding methods of traditional Chinese medicine mainly include mechanical grinding, vibration grinding and air flow grinding. There are many domestic ultra-fine grinding production industrial equipment for sale, including vibration mill, mechanical shearing mill, low-temperature mill, air flow mill. The latter two are widely used in the pharmaceutical industry, and among the air flow mills, the fluidized bed air flow ultra-fine mill is the most widely used.
Mechanical ultrafine grinding can be divided into dry grinding and wet grinding. According to the different principles of generating grinding force during the grinding process, dry grinding includes air flow type, high-frequency vibration type, rotating ball (rod) mill type, hammer type and self-grinding type. Wet grinding mainly includes colloid mill and homogenizer.
Modern ultrafine powder technology is a microscopic combination of drugs, making full use of micronization, compounding, precision, surface modification and particle design technology to make drugs reach a higher level. In this regard, there is a wide range of technical space for research and utilization. In-depth research and application of this technology will be a new technical growth point and a new economic growth point for traditional Chinese medicine.