Embedding Automation in the Pharma Research Laboratory to Enable Drug Substance and Product Development

Automation and High Throughput Screening are helping to drive innovation in drug development. Advances in technology and collaboration have opened the door to a wide range of physical and digital automation solutions to produce higher quality data at a much faster pace. Modular Solid and Liquid handlers along with a range of integrated analytical equipment offer both flexibility in experiment design as well as coordination among different users. Solubility and stability screens create robust synthesis and isolation processes on an accelerated timeline. Automated parallel reactor systems allow for controlled pressurized reactions and timed sampling, enabling kinetic reaction screens and Design of Experiment (DoE). Data tools such as Spotfire give options to better organize, analyze, and visualize data, enabling faster recall of information and better decision making. How these technologies have been implemented and the benefits they have on research timelines, data quality, and productivity will be presented.