PHARMACEUTICAL CO-CRYSTALS - AN APPROACH TO INCREASE SOLUBILITY AND BIOAVAILABILITY

Abstract

In order to formulate a successful dosage form, researchers should rely on various physicochemical properties of active pharmaceutical ingredient (API). Pharmaceutical industry is striving hard on various limitations encountered by API like stability, solubility, bioavailability and mechanical properties. Among various solid state forms like polymorphs, solvates, hydrates and amorphous solids, crystals and crystalline solids gain much importance in pharmaceutical industry due to their higher stability and reproducibility. Taking this into the account more research was done on crystals and crystalline properties of API, which leads to inventing a new method called co-crystallization with improved properties of solubility and bioavailability even on high temperatures and high relative humidity. Cocrystallization technique provides effective means to discover alternate solid dosage forms in various complex organic molecules. Hence this review explains about the advantages and disadvantages, properties and methods for the preparation of co-crystals, characterization techniques, recent advancements and various marketed preparations of pharmaceutical cocrystal.