This chapter describes the importance of deepening our understanding of material properties and their effect on process performance. There are many measurement techniques to describe the complex nature of powders, some of which are provided in this chapter. Strong knowledge of multivariate analysis is essential to extract useful information from the vast data typically generated in developing and operating continuous systems. Two of the most common methods, principal component analysis and clustering analysis, are described. This is followed by some of the applications of the material property databases along with a case study to highlight the importance of developing material data libraries to enable robust continuous process development.

• Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
• Merck & Co., Inc.
• Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc. / Hovione / U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

• PAT
• Oral solid dose

1. continuous pharmaceutical manufacturing
2. Material property library
3. Multivariate analysis
4. oral solid dose
5. Other
6. pat
7. Powder characterization