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Effective Process R&D
Management Needs
Effective PTC Process Screening
As every process R&D
manager knows, the decisions made in the early stages of process screening have
a significant impact on the downstream stages of process development and
scale-up. The challenge of the process R&D manager is to identify the
technology most likely to be successful for a given process in the shortest
period of time while investing the minimum amount of R&D resources. Often,
phase-transfer catalysis is the technology most likely to be successful. If PTC
really does excel in thousands of reactions in over 40 reaction categories, why
isn't PTC screened more often?
Simply put, without highly
specialized expertise in PTC, it is likely to take too much valuable time during
the busy and crucial process screening program to determine if PTC is a
reasonable process option. Effective process screening can be achieved by
applying the highly specialized PTC expertise of PTC Organics at the pivotal
screening stage to achieve resource-efficient proof-of-concept.
Good
news...PTC can be screened rapidly and effectively by PTC experts
During the first weeks of screening, PTC Organics’ PTC experts identify
the most crucial process parameters and specialized PTC techniques for the
specific process, which are most likely to lead to success. PTC process
screening and development is designed and executed by PTC Organics in two
stages:
PTC Process Screening
Achieve promising
results or determine proof-of-concept
PTC Process Development
Definition of PTC
process parameters ready for scale-up
If promising PTC conditions are not discovered rapidly, PTC is often
abandoned as a viable route. Scale-up then occurs with a non-optimal, non-PTC
process and retrofit is, in certain cases, not possible due to registration
constraints (e.g., pharmaceuticals). Even high-throughput screening or Design of
Experiments can lead to an incorrect conclusion about the potential feasibility
of a PTC process option when specialized PTC expertise is not available to
identify key non-obvious parameters and set the proper limits.
PTC Organics has helped customers overcome many common challenges and pitfalls
which are specific to PTC Process Screening. These include:
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Address the most important
PTC process parameters first (catalyst is usually NOT
first).
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Plan for catalyst
separation method at the outset to assure high product assay.
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Broaden the scope of
process options using water-sensitive reactants/products.
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Achieve promising
reactivity, volume efficiency and raw material efficiency by choosing
surprisingly low levels of water, solvent and agitation at the outset.
In summary, integration of your process chemistry department with the expertise
of PTC Organics is a highly efficient way to achieve peak performance from your
process R&D program in the most cost-effective manner. Contact Marc Halpern
(tel +1 856-222-1146 or E-mail) to integrate PTC Contract
Research or PTC Consulting into your process screening and development programs.
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