Development of hot-melt extrusion as a novel technique for the ...

Interestingly, no difference was observed in the in vivo taste scores for both polymers at thesame PMOL loadings. For example at 40% PMOL loading the average panellists‘ score wasidentical for EPO and VA64 extrudates respectively.Fig. 4.3: Schematic representation of the taste scores of pure API, bulk polymers and theextruded formulations.A novel in vitro approach to evaluate the taste masking efficiency of variouspharmaceutical dosage forms and avoid problems related to human panelists is the use ofelectronic sensor arrays [39-42] known as electronic tongues (e – tongue). Similar studies wereperformed by other researchers where a principal component analysis (PCA) of activeformulations against the placebo was presented through PCA maps in order to determine thetaste masking potency of various components [43-45] . For the purposes of the study purePMOL, bulk polymers and extruded granules were processed as described in the previoussection. The signal of the different formulations was represented on taste maps based on aprojection obtained by PCA as depicted in Fig. 4.4a- b. These maps showed the relativerepartition and proximity of bitterness for each formulation.75 | P a g e