Application Note: Particle Characterization Of Nutraceutical Products

Nutraceuticals are food extracts that have been demonstrated to produce a physiological benefit or provide some protection against chronic disease. As the name implies, nutraceuticals are the intersection of nutrition and pharmaceutical and is an umbrella term that can also include functional foods and dietary supplements. In the same way that the particle size and shape distributions of active pharmaceutical ingredients and drug delivery systems effect their solubility and bioavailability, so is particle characterization critical to nutraceuticals. Laser diffraction particle size analyzers offer the same benefits in speed, precision, and reliability to nutraceutical materials that have made the technique popular in the pharmaceutical industry.

Nutraceuticals possess certain qualities that promise consumer popularity as well. Culturally, there is an ongoing shift towards purchasing naturally derived goods and drugs and this shift lends a "cure preference" to nutraceuticals as opposed to pharmaceuticals. Additionally, the typically high cost of drug discovery (which in turn leads to high cost prescription drugs) is mitigated given the narrowed scope of active nutraceutical ingredients. Many foods already provide empirical evidence of imparting disease resistance to the consumer. The challenge is to identify which components of healthy foods make them so, but with the advantage that the active ingredient location is confined to the food. To this end nutraceutical, pharmaceutical, and biotechnology companies have committed billions of dollars towards the research and development of commercially available foodstuffs that are both biocompatible and bioavailable.