Predicting the drug release kinetics of matrix tablets

Pages: 261 - 277, Volume 12, Issue 2, September 2009

doi:10.3934/dcdsb.2009.12.261       Abstract        Full Text (1247.9K)       Related Articles

Boris Baeumer - Department of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand (email)
Lipika Chatterjee - New Zealand's National School of Pharmacy, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand (email)
Peter Hinow - Institute for Mathematics and its Applications, University of Minnesota, 114 Lind Hall, Minneapolis, MN 55455, United States (email)
Thomas Rades - New Zealand's National School of Pharmacy, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand (email)
Ami Radunskaya - Department of Mathematics, Pomona College, 610 N. College Ave., Claremont, CA 91711, United States (email)
Ian Tucker - New Zealand's National School of Pharmacy, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand (email)

Abstract: In this paper we develop two mathematical models to predict the release kinetics of a water soluble drug from a polymer/excipient matrix tablet. The first of our models consists of a random walk on a weighted graph, where the vertices of the graph represent particles of drug, excipient and polymer, respectively. The graph itself is the contact graph of a multidisperse random sphere packing. The second model describes the dissolution and the subsequent diffusion of the active drug out of a porous matrix using a system of partial differential equations. The predictions of both models show good qualitative agreement with experimental release curves. The models will provide tools for designing better controlled release devices.

Keywords:  Matrix tablets, drug release kinetics, mathematical modeling.
Mathematics Subject Classification:  Primary: 92C50.

Received: October 2008;      Revised: April 2009;      Published: July 2009.