able to produce four drugs formulated as solutions

Drug manufacturing can take weeks or months to complete, but a new device can do in 24 hours.

Researchers have designed a system - the size of an average refrigerator - that can be easily transported in case of outbreaks, supply shortage or if a manufacturing plant shuts down.

Called Pharmacy on Demand, the technology makes thousands of doses of medicine a day.

Researchers have designed a system, the size of an average refrigerator, that can be easily transported in case of outbreaks, supply shortage or if a manufacturing plant shuts down. Called Pharmacy on Demand, the technology makes thousands of doses of medicine a day

HOW DOES PHARMACY ON DEMAND WORK? Compared to traditional methods, MIT uses small tubes as opposed to the massive vats to develop chemical reactions. Traditional batch processing, which is used by drug manufactures, is limited by the difficulty of cooling these vats, but the flow system allows reactions that produce a great deal of heat to be run safely. The chemical reactions required to synthesize each drug take place in the first of two modules. The reactions were designed so that they can take place at temperatures up to 250 degrees Celsius and pressures up to 17 atmospheres. By swapping in different module components, the researchers can easily reconfigure the system to produce different drugs. Advertisement

There are numerous steps drug manufactures must conduct before sending their product to market.

And pharmaceutical companies are looking into developing a 'flow process', which allows everything to be done at one location.

'Pharmaceutical manufacturing typically uses batch processing at multiple locations. Disadvantages of this approach include long production times and the potential for supply chain disruptions,' reads the study published in American Association for the Advancement of Science.

'As a preliminary demonstration of an alternative approach, we report here the continuous-flow synthesis and formulation of active pharmaceutical ingredients in a compact.'

Researchers from Massachusetts Technical Institute have engineered this device in order to help this process become the procedure.

'Think of this as an energy backup for pharmaceutical manufacturing,' Allan Myerson, a MIT professor of the practice in the Department of Chemical Engineering, told MIT News.

'The purpose is not to replace traditional manufacturing; it's to provide an alternative for these special situations.'

Pharmacy on Demand was built from a previous endeavor the team worked on, which was a much larger prototype.

Building from that technology, the team was able to create a smaller, transportable device.

This new system is able to produce four drugs formulated as solutions or suspensions --Benadryl, lidocaine, Valium and Prozac.

This new system is able to produce four drugs formulated as solutions or suspensions --Benadryl, lidocaine, Valium and Prozac (pictured). And within 24 hours, it can make about 1,000 doses of any of the four drugs. Compared to traditional methods, MIT uses small tubes

And within 24 hours, it can make about 1,000 doses of any of the four drugs.

Compared to traditional methods, MIT uses small tubes as opposed to the massive vats to develop chemical reactions.

Traditional batch processing, which is used by drug manufactures, is limited by the difficulty of cooling these vats, but the flow system allows reactions that produce a great deal of heat to be run safely.

'In many cases we were developing syntheses of targets that had never been done in a continuous flow platform,' said Timothy Jamison, a MIT professor of the practice in the Department of Chemistry.

'That presents a lot of challenges even if there is a good precedent from the batch perspective.

'We also recognized it as an opportunity where, because of some of the phenomena that one can leverage in [a flow-based system], you can make molecules differently.'

Another advantage to this compact system is that it allows manufacturers to create small batches of drugs, which would be too expensive to do in a large-scale plant.

This method would be ideal for 'orphan drugs' – drugs that are only needed by a small group of patients.

And because drugs can be made on demand, regions with few pharmaceutical storage facilities would be able to meet the need of their patients.

The team is continue their work by making the system 40 percent smaller and producing drugs that are more complex.