Avenues for cocrystallisation of pharmaceuticals using solid state methods

Abstract

Crystal engineering principles may be applied to a variety of materials with the goal of optimising their physical properties without chemical alterations. This is especially useful when considering active pharmaceutical ingredients (API). Cocrystallisation of APIs is carried out using coformers which are found on the generally regarded as safe (GRAS) list. The large variety of materials that are found on this list gives a lot of potential for cocrystal synthesis, however coformer selection is not a trivial process and simple trial and error can result in a large volume of physical experimentation. Computational methods may be used to tackle this issue and narrow down a list of coformers which are suitable for cocrystal formation with different API molecules.