LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Process Systems Enterprise (PSE), providers of the gSOLIDS^TM modeling environment for integrated solids processes, today announced that it has joined the National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Structured Organic Particulate Systems (C-SOPS).

C-SOPS is a consortium of four universities led by Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. Industry partners include Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble. The consortium was set up to be a focal point for science-based development of structured organic composite products and their manufacturing processes in the pharmaceutical, food, consumer product and agrochemical industries.

Center Director, Dr Fernando Muzzio, says “Our aims include the development of science and engineering methods for designing, scaling, optimizing and controlling manufacturing processes. Given its gSOLIDS platform and process optimization focus, PSE will be able to contribute significantly to all of these objectives as well as enable effective technology transfer to industry.”

Developed in conjunction with Procter & Gamble, another Center member, gSOLIDS provides an integrated drag & drop graphical flowsheeting environment for model-based engineering and optimization of solids processes. Population balance-based models of solids processing equipment are used to validate models against experimental data, optimize process design and operation, determine optimal process economics and quantify and manage risk.

gSOLIDS covers units such as high-shear wet granulators, fluidized bed dryers, mills, screens, spray dryers and agglomerators. Key goals are to maximize throughput, ensure product quality, size recycles and surge bins for new plants, determine optimal trade-offs between capital and operating cost and make informed purchasing decisions.

Typical benefits include reduced capital investment, reduced operating costs, improved product quality, increased throughput, more flexible process design, reduced CO₂ footprint and a better process understanding.

Dr Sean Bermingham, VP of PSE’s Solids strategic business division, says “We are delighted to be part of the industry-leading C-SOPS consortium, in particular through the use of gSOLIDS as a vehicle for enabling and capturing research and transferring it to industry in usable form. This is key to reducing process development and commissioning timelines as well as ensuring that the design capacity is reached or exceeded.”