secondary drying raises a handful of sensible questions. This page answers them in order, starting with the fundamentals and moving to applications.
This page was last updated on 2026-08-01 and is reviewed periodically as new material appears.
A freeze-dryer consists of a vacuum chamber, temperature-controlled shelves, a condenser, and a vacuum pump. Vials, ampoules, or bulk trays hold the product during the cycle. The condenser traps water vapor as ice at a temperature lower than the product. Cycle development balances shelf temperature, chamber pressure, and time. Scale-up can be difficult because heat and mass transfer change with equipment size, so process analytical tools and conservative validation are often used.
Lyophilization is a dehydration technique in which a product is frozen and the solvent is removed under reduced pressure. The low pressure allows ice to sublimate directly into vapor without passing through a bulk liquid phase. This differs from conventional drying, where heat drives evaporation and can damage heat-sensitive structures. The process is used for biological materials, pharmaceutical formulations, and some foods. Its main advantage is preservation of porous structure and rapid reconstitution.
The physics of lyophilization couples heat transfer, mass transfer, and phase behavior. Sublimation requires a vapor pressure difference between the ice front and the chamber, and the dried layer adds resistance to vapor flow. Amorphous formulations are characterized by a glass transition temperature of the maximally freeze-concentrated solute, often denoted Tg'. Crystalline bulking agents can provide structure, while amorphous excipients stabilize labile components. Open questions remain about spatial heterogeneity, edge effects, and how laboratory cycles scale to production.
Lyophilization is a drying process in which a solvent, usually water, is removed from a frozen material by sublimation under reduced pressure. The material is first solidified, then placed under vacuum so that ice transitions directly to vapor without a bulk liquid phase. This approach suits heat-sensitive substances that would degrade during conventional evaporation. Primary drying removes unbound ice, while secondary drying reduces water that remains adsorbed to the solid matrix. The result is a porous, lightweight solid that can be reconstituted later.
A typical cycle begins with freezing, sometimes including an annealing step to control ice crystal size. Freezing conditions influence the pore network that later allows vapor escape. During primary drying, shelf temperature and chamber pressure are set so heat enters the product while its temperature stays below the collapse or eutectic point. Secondary drying then raises the shelf temperature to desorb bound water and lower residual moisture. Cycle design depends on formulation, fill volume, container type, and equipment capability.
| Property | Value | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Common synonyms | freeze-drying, lyophilisation, cryodesiccation | Lyophilization is common in pharmaceutical literature. |
| Typical chamber pressure during primary drying | 0.05–0.5 mbar (5–50 Pa) | Must remain below the triple point of water. |
| Typical shelf temperature during freezing | −40 to −20 °C | Lower temperatures may be used for eutectic systems. |
| Typical residual moisture after secondary drying | 0.5–3% w/w | Product-dependent; low moisture improves stability but can cause over-drying. |
| Typical analytical method for residual moisture | Karl Fischer titration or loss on drying | Thermogravimetric methods are also used. |
The physics of lyophilization depends on phase boundaries and heat and mass transfer. During primary drying, heat supplied to the product must equal the latent heat of sublimation, while water vapor moves through the drying cake to the condenser. If shelf temperature or pressure is set too high, the ice front can exceed the collapse temperature, causing meltback or pore collapse. If conditions are too cold, drying slows and costs rise. Formulation excipients, vial geometry, and freezing rate alter these limits.
Equipment for lyophilization includes a vacuum chamber, temperature-controlled shelves, a condenser, and a vacuum pump. A refrigeration system cools the shelves and condenser below the product's freezing point. Process monitoring often uses Pirani and capacitance manometers, thermocouples, and resistance sensors. Cycle development balances product quality with time and energy use. Some products are annealed during freezing to improve crystallization of bulking agents. Open questions remain about scaling cycles between laboratory, pilot, and production freeze-dryers.
Lyophilization, also called freeze-drying, removes water from a frozen material by sublimation under reduced pressure. The process begins with freezing, which converts free water into ice and may also produce a glassy phase. Primary drying then lowers chamber pressure so ice sublimes directly to vapor without passing through a liquid stage. Secondary drying raises the temperature modestly to remove bound water. The result is a porous, dry solid that usually reconstitutes quickly. Each stage influences pore structure, residual moisture, and stability.
Lyophilization removes water by freezing a material and then lowering pressure so ice changes directly to vapor. The process relies on sublimation, the phase transition from solid to gas without an intermediate liquid state. Because the material remains frozen during primary drying, the structure often stays porous. This porous matrix can rehydrate quickly when water is added back. The low pressure also allows vapor to leave the solid matrix without boiling.
A typical cycle begins with freezing, which fixes the material into a solid and determines ice crystal size. Primary drying then raises heat under vacuum so ice sublimes, often near or below the collapse temperature of the formulation. Secondary drying removes bound water that remains after ice is gone, usually by gently warming the product. Each stage balances heat input against pressure to avoid melting or structural damage. Temperature probes and pressure sensors guide the transition between stages.
Lyophilization is a dehydration process that removes water from a frozen material by sublimation under low pressure. The material is first frozen to convert liquid water into ice. Next, the pressure is reduced below the triple point of water so that ice changes directly into vapor without passing through a liquid phase. This step is called primary drying. The result is a porous solid or cake that retains the original shape of the frozen solution.
After primary drying, secondary drying removes water that remains bound to the material. This stage raises the shelf temperature while maintaining low pressure, which encourages desorption of unfrozen water. Residual moisture can be reduced to a low percentage, improving stability for many products. The process parameters, including freezing rate, shelf temperature, and chamber pressure, influence the final pore structure and reconstitution behavior. Control of these variables helps prevent collapse or meltback during drying.
A formulation often contains excipients that protect the active ingredient during freezing and drying. Bulking agents provide structure, while lyoprotectants stabilize sensitive molecules. The freezing step can produce ice crystals whose size and distribution affect the drying rate, and cycle design includes freezing, annealing, and drying phases. If the product temperature rises above a critical value, the cake may collapse or lose its porous structure. Successful lyophilization therefore depends on the interaction between formulation, equipment, and cycle design.
The marking should not change the animal's behavior or their ability to survive, including detection by predators; it should not affect the animal's susceptibility to capture; it should allow each individual to be marked uniquely and it should be permanent. Many species have been experimentally freeze branded to assess the technique's suitability for animal tracking in scientific research. (See Freeze brand § Table of branding durations above for some of these attempts.) Amphibians have proved one of the more successful applications, though freeze branding in scientific research remains relatively rare compared to traditional methods like tagging and radio tracking.
Using alpha particles from radium to strike air, Rutherford detected scintillation on a zinc sulfide screen at a distance, up to 28 cm, well beyond the distance of alpha-particle range of travel but instead corresponding to the range of travel of hydrogen atoms. By 1920 he concluded that these hydrogen nuclei were a constituent part of the nitrogen nucleus. This result has been described as the discovery of protons. When Rutherford described his results at the British Association for the Advancement of Science August 1920 he was asked by Oliver Lodge for a new name for the positive hydrogen nucleus to avoid confusion with the neutral hydrogen atom. Rutherford initially suggested both proton (the neuter singular of the Greek word for "first", πρῶτον) and prouton (after Prout). Rutherford later reported that the meeting had accepted his suggestion that the hydrogen nucleus be named the "proton", following Prout's word "protyle". The first use of the word "proton" in the scientific literature appeared in 1920. Rutherford initially assumed that the alpha particle merely knocked a proton out of nitrogen, turning it into carbon. Patrick Blackett's cloud chamber images in 1925 demonstrated that the alpha particle was absorbed. If the alpha particle were not absorbed, then three charged particles, a negatively charged carbon, a proton, and an alpha particle, would be expected. The three charged particles would create three tracks in the cloud chamber, but only two tracks in the cloud chamber were observed. Blackett proposed that the alpha particle is absorbed by the nitrogen atom.
=== Lisa Dearn === Lisa Dearn (Chloe Pirrie) is the deputy energy secretary leading the government inquest against Lumi following its collapse. She presses Robert and Henry with pointed questions about Pierpoint's overvaluation of Lumi, as well as Henry's sexual harassment of his employees. In series 4, Lisa is now Secretary of State for Business and Trade. Her far-left views trouble Lord Norton, who is concerned about the waning influence of legacy media under the new Labour government, and perceives her stance as anti-business. She and Minister for Industry Jennifer Bevan meet with Henry, now CEO of payment processing startup Tender, and CFO Whitney Halberstram, when the two seek regulatory approval for a merger with IBN Bauer Bank. Lisa is skeptical of the merger, deeming it monopolistic and self-serving on Henry's part, but the Prime Minister's chief of staff Ricky Martyn arrives to pressure the regulator into approving the merger lest Labour appear anti-business, with Bevan implied to have engineered the intervention. Government support for Tender forces Lisa to publicly back the company as beneficial to the UK consumer during the launch of its banking app, despite her personal skepticism and disgust for Henry. After news breaks of Tender's fraud, Yasmin plots to pin the company's failure on the Labour government, and circulates a lie in the press that Dearn suppressed an internal memo voicing concerns about Tender while expediting Tender's banking license and regulatory approvals.
Stachys affinis, commonly called crosne, Chinese artichoke, Japanese artichoke, knotroot, or artichoke betony, is a perennial herbaceous plant of the family Lamiaceae, originating from China. Its rhizome is a root vegetable that can be eaten raw, pickled, dried or cooked.
== Society == In March 2013, there was media coverage of a British 7-year-old boy named Owen, with chronically tense muscles due to SJS, and his three-legged pet dog. They became first-place winners of the 2013 Crufts Kennel Club's annual Friends for Life competition, which "celebrates dogs that have truly earned the title of man’s best friend through bravery, support or companionship". The dog was also awarded The Braveheart Honour in the ceremony of The British Animal Honours in April 2013 (Haatchi the dog). The two are featured in the book Haatchi & Little B (2014, ISBN 125-006-936-X) by Wendy Holden and on Haatchi's Facebook page. In 2016, 9-year-old Owen was featured in a TLC documentary series, Two in a Million, in which he met and formed a friendship with Giovanni, a 7-year-old American boy with SJS.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
== Investments == Mubadala has invested in logistics software startup Turvo, Alphabet-owned self-driving technology company Waymo, Reliance Jio Platforms, UK life sciences company Envision, and Telegram. Mubadala is a parent company of GlobalFoundries, a semiconductor foundry company. Mubadala owns stakes in numerous companies, including a 7.5 percent share in the Carlyle Group. In 2007 Mubadala announced an initial investment in AMD. As of 2017 Mubadala had a stake of 12.9 percent in the chipmaker. In 2019 Mubadala sold its entire stake in AMD. In 2019, Mubadala and Falcon Edge Capital established Abu Dhabi Catalyst Partners, a $1 billion joint venture to invest in financial institutions. In November 2020, Mubadala transferred ownership of two information technology companies it previously owned, Injazat and Khazna, to artificial intelligence company, G42, and took a stake in G42. In 2021, Mubadala purchased a 2.6% stake in En+ Group, a manufacturer of green aluminum, from Polina Yumasheva, the former wife of Russian businessman Oleg Deripaska. The same year, Mubadala purchased MetrôRio, the company that holds the operations for the Rio de Janeiro metro, from Invepar. In 2016, Mubadala became the biggest external shareholder at Investcorp, after acquiring 20% stakes in the Bahraini firm. In 2023, a former UK minister, Gerry Grimstone was criticized for conducting and not declaring 13 meetings with Mubadala and Khaldoon al-Mubarak, after acquiring the role as an adviser and the chair of planned climate fund at Investcorp.
Noncatalytic functions that FAD can play in flavoproteins include as structural roles, or involved in blue-sensitive light photoreceptors that regulate biological clocks and development, generation of light in bioluminescent bacteria.
Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a polymeric molecule that is essential for most biological functions, either by performing the function itself (non-coding RNA) or by forming a template for the production of proteins (messenger RNA). RNA and deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) are nucleic acids. The nucleic acids constitute one of the four major macromolecules essential for all known forms of life. RNA is assembled as a chain of nucleotides. Cellular organisms use messenger RNA (mRNA) to convey genetic information (using the nitrogenous bases of guanine, uracil, adenine, and cytosine, denoted by the letters G, U, A, and C) that directs synthesis of specific proteins. Many viruses encode their genetic information using an RNA genome. Some RNA molecules play an active role within cells by catalyzing biological reactions, controlling gene expression, or sensing and communicating responses to cellular signals. One of these active processes is protein synthesis, a universal function in which RNA molecules direct the synthesis of proteins on ribosomes. This process uses transfer RNA (tRNA) molecules to deliver amino acids to the ribosome, where ribosomal RNA (rRNA) then links amino acids together to form coded proteins.
Materiel or matériel (; from French matériel 'equipment, hardware') is supplies, equipment, and weapons in military supply-chain management, and typically supplies and equipment in a commercial supply chain context.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
== Related compounds == Later work showed that replacing the chlorine atom with a fluorine atom (2F-Viminol) or with a trifluoromethyl group produced a compound with twice the potency and half the acute toxicity. A later team at Zambon found that one isomer of a pyrrolidone analog is 318 times as potent as morphine in its analgesic activity in animal studies. A number of related compounds were also found to be active, allowing a QSAR model to be constructed.
== A new home for biochemistry in Liverpool == The world's first Biochemistry Department (originally employing the archaic term 'Bio-chemistry') opened its research doors in 1903 within the newly created Johnston Laboratories, forming an early biomedical hub with other buildings that homed the Nobel Prize winning neurophysiologist Sir Charles Sherrington, who coined the term synapse. The original buildings are still in use today by the university, although not for laboratory-based research. The public-health scientist and visionary Benjamin Moore, was the inaugural holder of the world's first chair in Biochemistry, named The Johnston Chair in honour of the local benefactor William Johnston, a prominent Liverpool businessman.
=== Care packs === Breakthrough T1D provides care packs containing resources and support for children, teens, and adults with T1D. One well-known care pack is the "Bag of Hope" in the US which contains toys and story books for children recently diagnosed with T1D to help them adjust. In Australia, the bag is called KIDSAC and each recipient receives their own Rufus, the Bear with Diabetes.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
Yes, the terms are generally interchangeable. Lyophilization is more common in pharmaceutical and laboratory contexts, while freeze-drying appears widely in food science and general writing. Both describe removal of solvent by sublimation under vacuum after freezing.
Reduced pressure keeps the process below the triple point of water, so ice can sublimate directly to vapor. It also lowers the temperature needed for drying, which helps preserve heat-sensitive materials. Without vacuum, melting or boiling could occur instead of controlled sublimation.
The rate depends on heat transfer to the product and mass transfer of vapor through the dried layer. A cold condenser, adequate vacuum, and suitable shelf temperature all influence speed. Formulation properties such as solid content and collapse temperature also set practical limits.
Freezing only converts liquid to solid. Lyophilization adds vacuum and controlled warming so frozen solvent sublimes, leaving a dry porous solid. The two steps are related but not interchangeable.