Mannitol is an alcohol sugar present in many plants and animals. It is a hexahedral alcohol widely used as an excipient in tablet formulation in pharmaceutical industries.
Uses of Mannitol
Mannitol has many different uses as an excipient e.g
- It is used as a Plasticizer.
- It is used as Diluent 10-90%
- It is a sweetening agent.
- Tonicity agent.
- Parenterally used as osmotic diuretics.
General properties of Mannitol
- Mannitol gives laxative effect when it is used in large quantities.
- it is non hygroscopic so mannitol is used in moisture-sensitive products.
- It is also used in direct compression because of its spray-dried grade.
- Processing time with mannitol is short because the drying time of mannitol is less. Mean when mannitol is used as a diluent in wet granulation its drying time is short, it dry in a short period.
In Chewable Tablets
Mannitol has widely used excipient in chewable tablets because it gives a sweet taste and mouth-feel so because of this effect it is used in chewable tablets.
Spray-dried Mannitol.
Mannitol is also available as spray-dried grade and spray dried grade is used in direct compression tablet formulation.
Tablets produced with spray-dried grade give more hardness than powdered mannitol.
Spray-dried mannitol flow rate is better than powder mannitol.
 Disintegration time of spray-dried mannitol is also short.
Powder mannitol has poor flow because it is in the form of fine powder. So when powder mannitol is used as a diluent in wet granulation of tablet manufacturing, it should be used intra-granular. When Mannitol is used in wet granulation it also reduces the drying time.
Also Read
- Use of starch and modified starch in pharmaceutical products.
- Types and classification of excipients.
- Role of Lactose in tablet granulation.
- Role of Croscarmellose Sodium.
- Role of Diabasic Calcium phosphate in tablet granulation.