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26 October 2020 Tablets & Capsules ture, acids, heat, and oxygen is also critical, as it enhances stability, bioavailability, and delivery. The powder must also be easy to handle and free flowing. The following study examined the possibility of incor- porating oily substances into a powder for encapsulation using only natural ingredients. The study simulated the following three applications using sunflower oil as an oil substitute: 1) 20 milligrams of hemp in a size 0 capsule; 2) 22.5 international units (IU) of vitamin E and approximately 15 milligrams of vitamin D3 in a size 1 capsule; and 3) 30 million colony forming units (CFU) of probiot- ics in a size 0 capsule using oil to make the probiot- ics more stable. Materials and methods To incorporate the sunflower oil into powder, the oil was blended into a natural and organic premixed mois- ture-absorbing dry binder (CompactCel MAB, Biogrund) using a high-shear mixer at a ratio of 1:3 oil to powder. The oil was added to the binder a little at a time to guar- antee a homogeneous distribution and avoid clumping. Three different trials using two different formulations were performed with the oily powder (Tables 2 and 4). For the encapsulation process, a Syntegon (formerly Bosch) GKF 705 was used, with different tamping pin heights, bowl fill heights, and machine speeds (rpm) (Tables 3 and 5). As the results show, the right speed, tamping pin height, and formulation is crucial when encapsulating an oil-powder blend into hard capsules. Results and discussion As previously mentioned, three applications served as the basis for the simulation (Table 6). In the nutraceutical industry, a relative standard deviation (RSD) below 5 percent of filled capsules is acceptable. The results of capsule set 1 (ratio 1:1) showed an RSD of 3.75 percent. This indicates that for formulation 1, the right combination of process param- eters was able to achieve good powder flow and consis- tently filled capsules. Ingredients (ratio 1:1) Percentage Target weight (milligrams) Oil content (milligrams) (% w/w) Oil-powder blend (25% oil w/w) 50 292 78 12.50 Flow aid (CompactCel FLO 305.17, Biogrund) 50 292 Total 100 584 Table 2 Formulation 1 Tamping pin height (millimeters) 7 10 13 16 19 Powder bowl height (millimeters) 15 15 20 20 20 Machine speed (rpm) 110 100 110 140 100 Mean (milligrams) 532 562 584 572 513 Standard deviation (milligrams) 48 31 22 25 54 Relative standard deviation (%) 9.06 5.52 3.75 4.39 10.63 Table 3 Capsule set 1 (Dosing disk thickness = 19.7 millimeters, size 0 HPMC capsules) Table 4 Formulation 2 Ingredients (ratio 1:2) Percentage Target weight (milligrams) Oil content (milligrams) (% w/w) Oil-powder blend (25% oil w/w) 37.67 220 55 9.42 Flow aid (CompactCel FLO 305.17, Biogrund) 62.33 364 Total 100 584 Tamping pin height (millimeters) 7 10 13 16 19 Powder bowl height (millimeters) 20 20 25 30 30 Machine speed (rpm) 110 140 110 110 140 Mean (milligrams) 564 508 559 563 553 Standard deviation (milligrams) 19 22 13 13 14 Relative standard deviation (%) 3.36 4.34 2.26 2.23 5.59 Table 5 Capsule set 2 (Dosing disk thickness = 19.7 millimeters, size 0 HPMC capsules) Photo 1: The formulations studied were encapsulated using a Syntegon GKF 705 capsule filler.