SBIR Phase I: Improved Sensors for Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I research project will allow the company to determine the feasibility of using new sensors, Multivariate Optical Elements (MOE), to improve process control for the manufacture of pharmaceuticals. Process control is a cycle of measuring a variable of interest, identifying what the magnitude or change in that measurement means, determining the needed response to the measurement, implementing the response, and re-measuring the variable of interest. The sensors being developed respond to specifically identified spectral patterns (optical fingerprint) associated with a compound of interest. The sensors proposed will have applicability in chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturing. The MOE technology provides a system that can be used to simplify measurements that currently require multivariate analysis of the spectral signal. This capability will speed response time for process control systems and provide a less expensive sensor. By reducing the cost of individual sensors, additional detection points can be added to the process. These sensors will enable chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturing to improve process control through identifying undesired chemical materials earlier in the process, better track the progress of chemical reactions, and generate QA data more rapidly.