Cross-sectional structures, spray-dried

FIGURE 1.14 Cross-sectional structures of spray-dried powders by CLSM. Wall materials MD (DE 2 and 20). 

In the last decade confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) was shown to be a helpful tool for various further tasks of microparticle characterization (Lamprecht et al., 2000a, b, c). It minimizes the light scattered from out-of-focus structures, and permits the identification of several compounds through use of different fluorescence labels. Therefore, CLSM can be applied as a non-destructive visualization technique for microparticles. Moreover, CLSM allows visualization and characterization of structures not only on the surface, but also inside the particles, provided the carrier matrices are sufficiently transparent and can be fluorescently labeled by collecting several coplanar cross-sections, a three-dimensional reconstruction of the inspected objects is possible. Figure 6.13 shows the application of CLSM to investigatation of the cross-sectional structures of spray-dried powders of maltodextrin (MD) with a dextrose equivalent value of DE = 2 and 20. Florescein sodium salt was dissolved in the feed solution as a fluorescent probe of the carrier... 

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