Pre-nucleation in high-shear wet granulation

Abstract

Wet granulation is broken down into three rate processes that are often inseparable from each other, hindering characterization of the relationship between operating conditions and product properties. Single-drop granulation is a form of drop-controlled nucleation intended to isolate the Wetting & Nucleation rate process. In this work, single-dropped granules (pre-nucleated granules) were charged to a mixer granulator under varied conditions to observe how the individual rate processes and resulting granulated product were affected by various pre-nucleation conditions. Batches with larger fractions of pre-nucleated granules tended to produce a larger granule size than batches with few or no pre-nucleated granules. A clear and consistent trend of deviation from traditional granulation results is observed. Liquid to solid ratio is ruled out as a sole cause for the deviation, indicating that pre-nucleation may have applications in granular material production with respect to liquid dosing in granules, granule size control, and efficient material usage.