Application of new technology in traditional Chinese medicine formula granules

China's traditional Chinese medicine industry has initially formed an industrial system of a certain scale and has become a strategic industry with strong development advantages and broad prospects in social development. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has attracted wide attention all over the world because of its definite curative effect and small side effects. However, due to backward technology, it can not be in line with international standards. Therefore, it is imperative to improve the production level and quality of traditional Chinese medicine.

Traditional Chinese medicine forms include pills, powder, ointment, pills, soup and wine, which generally have some shortcomings, such as large dosage, large volume, rough preparation, backward technology and difficulty in taking. Later, dosage forms were reformed, and Chinese medicine tablets, capsules, granules, oral liquids, injections and other dosage forms appeared. Recently, microcapsules, dropping pills, liposome preparations and sustained-release and controlled-release preparations have appeared. Traditional Chinese medicine formula granule is a new dosage form, which is both traditional and modern, and combines many new technologies in the production process.

1. Supercritical extraction technology (SFE)

Supercritical carbon dioxide extraction (SFE) technology has high extraction and separation efficiency, low extraction temperature and low evaporation temperature, which can effectively protect easily oxidized or volatile components. Secondly, the solvent can be pressed into the cells at a high pressure to make the extraction complete; In addition, carbon dioxide has no toxic and side effects, and there is basically no residue in the extract, which is an incomparable advantage of other organic solvents. Therefore, this technology is mainly used to extract lipophilic and heat-sensitive components, such as volatile components such as angelica sinensis and Ligusticum chuanxiong.

2. Ultrafine powder technology

Ultrafine powder technology can crush Chinese herbal medicines into powder with a central particle size greater than 1000 mesh. The specific surface area of ultrafine powder is large, which increases the contact area of drug delivery site and improves the absorption speed and degree of effective components. In addition, the ultra-fine powder technology will not cause local overheating in the grinding process, and it is carried out at low temperature, so the grinding speed is fast, and the bioactive substances and various nutritional components in traditional Chinese medicine can be retained to a certain extent. This technology is mainly used for crushing mineral drugs in the production of traditional Chinese medicine formula granules.

3. Ultrafiltration technology (membrane separation technology)

Membrane separation technology is a filtration technology for molecular separation based on the molecular weight difference between chemical components. It uses asymmetric porous membrane to filter the liquid medicine through the pressure difference between the two sides of the membrane. The advantages of this filtration technology are no phase change, no heating, less energy consumption, mild operating conditions, no need to add chemical reagents and no damage to heat-sensitive drugs. This technology is used to clarify the liquid phase, refine the drug body in the solid phase, and separate the effective parts from the monomers in the production process of traditional Chinese medicine formula granules.

4. Adsorption separation technology

Adsorption separation technology is a method of using new adsorbents, such as macroporous resin, to adsorb effective components in liquid medicine or remove impurities in liquid medicine. It is used to extract many kinds of traditional Chinese medicines or compounds.

5. β -cyclodextrin inclusion technology

Many components containing volatile oil in traditional Chinese medicine preparations are volatile and unstable when they are made into preparations. β -cyclodextrin has good external hydrophilicity and internal hydrophobicity, which can increase the solubility and dissolution of drugs. It can also prevent the volatilization of volatile drugs; It can also cover up the bad smell of drugs and reduce irritation; Improve stability, oxidation resistance, photolysis resistance, thermal decomposition resistance, etc. This technology greatly improves the preservation rate and stability of volatile components in traditional Chinese medicine formula granules.

6. Application technology of modern analytical instruments

The core problem of traditional Chinese medicine formula granules is the establishment of quality standards. During the production and detection of Tianjiang brand Chinese medicine formula granules, the quality standards of raw materials, intermediates, semi-finished products and finished products were established with the help of modern analysis and detection instruments owned by the company, such as high performance liquid chromatograph, gas chromatograph, atomic absorption spectrometer, ultraviolet spectrophotometer, thin-layer scanner and thin-layer digital imaging system, which effectively ensured the quality of products.