Application of artificial neural networks to the nondestructive determination of ciprofloxacin hydrochloride in powder by short-wavelength NIR spectroscopy

The present study is aimed at providing a new short-wavelength near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopic method for the nondestructive quantitative analysis of ciprofloxacin hydrochloride in powder via artificial neural networks (ANNs). For this purpose, the NIR spectra of 90 experimental powder samples in the range 700–1100 mm were analyzed. Four different pretreatment methods—first-derivative, second-derivative, standard normal variate (SNV), and multiplicative scatter correction (MSC)—were applied to three sets of the NIR spectra of the powder samples. Among all of the ANN models, the first-derivative model is found to be the best. The results presented here demonstrate that the short-wavelength NIR region is promising for the fast and reliable determination of the major components in pharmaceuticals. The degree of approximation as an evaluation criterion prevents the overfitting phenomenon occurring in ANNs. The text was submitted by the authors in English.     

Artificial neural networks for non-destructive determination of acetylspiramycin powder by short-wavelength NIR spectroscopy

The present study has aimed at providing new insight into short-wavelength near-infrared (SW-NIR) spectroscopy (780–1100 nm) for non-destructive quantitative analysis of acetylspiramycin (macrolide antibiotics) powder by using artificial neural networks (ANNs). Presently, it was shown the third vibrational overtone of the CH stretching band can be used to quantitatively determine constituents in pharmaceutical. The third overtone referred to as the SW-NIR region ranges from 780 nm to 1100 nm. In this paper, 156 experimental samples of acetylspiramycin powder were analyzed using ANNs in the 780–1100 nm region of SW-NIR spectra. Four different pretreated methods (first-derivative, second-derivative, standard normal variate (SNV) and multiplicative scatter correction (MSC)) were applied to three sets of SW-NIR spectra of powder samples. The results presented here demonstrate that the SW-NIR region is promising for the fast and reliable determination of major component in pharmaceutical analysis. Degree of approximation as an evaluation criterion of the network was employed, which proved the accuracy of the predicted results.     

温度限制串联相关网络-近红外光谱法用于药物甲硝唑的质量控制

近红外漫反射光谱是一种简便、快速的有机物分析方法,样品不需处理即可直接测量,易于实现固态样非破坏测定.近红外漫反射光谱分析技术广泛应用于农业、食品、化妆品、烟草和石油等方面的组分分用近红外漫反射光谱法进行药品的非破坏性分析正成为国际热门课题.但近红外漫反射光谱的光谱范宽,吸收强度很弱,且组分间光谱严重重叠,给非破坏性分析带来了困难.而近红外漫反射光谱法与化量学相结合,能有效地解决光谱重叠带来的问题[1～3].     

Orthogonal projection to latent structures combined with artificial neural networks in non-destructive analysis of Ampicillin powder

A new method orthogonal projection to latent structures (O-PLS) combined with artificial neural networks is investigated for non-destructive determination of Ampicillin powder via near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy. The modern NIR spectroscopy analysis technique is efficient, simple and non-destructive, which has been used in chemical analysis in diverse fields. Be a preprocessing method, O-PLS provides a way to remove systematic variation from an input data set X not correlated to the response set Y, and does not disturb the correlation between X and Y. In this paper, O-PLS pretreated spectral data was applied to establish the ANN model of Ampicillin powder, in this model, the concentration of Ampicillin as the active component was determined. The degree of approximation was employed as the selective criterion of the optimum network parameters. In order to compare the OPLS-ANN model, the calibration models that using first-derivative and second-derivative preprocessing spectra were also designed. Experimental results showed that the OPLS-ANN model was the best.     

Nondestructive Discrimination of Pharmaceutical Preparations Using Near-Infrared Spectroscopy and Partial Least-Squares Discriminant Analysis

Metronidazole is a widely used antibacterial and amoebicide drug. The feasibility of the classification of metronidazole samples with respect to their brands was investigated by near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy along with chemometrics. A total of 92 samples of different lots and four brands were collected for measurements. First, principal component analysis was conducted to visualize the difference between metronidazole samples of different brands. Then, based on an effective classifier-independent method, i.e., joint mutual information, only the 30 most important variables were selected for modeling. From the independent test set, the partial least-squares discriminant analysis model based on the reduced variable set was compared with the corresponding full-spectrum model using all variables, which indicates the model based on the reduced variable set outperforms the full-spectrum model. It appears that the combination of NIR spectroscopy, joint mutual information, and partial least-squares discriminant analysis is a potential method for the classification of metronidazole from different brands and can, therefore, be used in the screening of counterfeit pharmaceutical products.     

Nondestructive determination of compound amoxicillin powder by NIR spectroscopy with the aid of chemometrics

Near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy, in combination with chemometrics, enables nondestructive analysis of solid samples without time-consuming sample preparation methods. A new method for the nondestructive determination of compound amoxicillin powder drug via NIR spectroscopy combined with an improved neural network model based on principal component analysis (PCA) and radial basis function (RBF) neural networks is investigated. The PCA technique is applied to extraction relevant features from lots of spectra data in order to reduce the input variables of the RBF neural networks. Various optimum principal component analysis-radial basis function (PCA-RBF) network models based on conventional spectra and preprocessing spectra (standard normal variate (SNV) and multiplicative scatter correction (MSC)) have been established and compared. Principal component regression (PCR) and partial least squares (PLS) multivariate calibrations are also used, which are compared with PCA-RBF neural networks. Experiment results show that the proposed PCA-RBF method is more efficient than PCR and PLS multivariate calibrations. And the PCA-RBF approach with SNV preprocessing spectra is found to provide the best performance.     

Calibration in non-linear NIR spectroscopy using principal component artificial neural networks

Near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy was used in simultaneous, non-destructive analysis of antipyriine and caffeine citrate tablets. Principal component artificial neural networks (PC-ANNs) were used to construct models for the analytes, using the testing set for external validation. Four pretreated spectra, namely, first-derivative, second-derivative, standard normal variate (SNV) and multiplicative scatter correction (MSC) spectra led to simplified and more robust models than conventional spectra. In PC-ANNs models, the spectra data were analyzed by principal component analysis (PCA) firstly. Then the scores of the principal compounds (PCs) were chosen as input nodes for input layer instead of the spectra data. The artificial neural networks (ANNs) models using the spectra data as input nodes were also established, which were compared with the PC-ANNs models. The result shows the SNV model of PC-ANNs multivariate calibration has the lowest training error and predicting error. The concept of the degree of approximation was introduced and performed as the selective criterion of the optimum network parameters.     

Quality control of the powder pharmaceutical samples of sulfaguanidine by using NIR reflectance spectrometry and temperature-constrained cascade correlation networks

Temperature-constrained cascade correlation networks (TCCCNs) were applied to the identification of the powder pharmaceutical samples of sulfaguanidine based on near infrared (NIR) diffuse reflectance spectra and their first derivative spectra. This work focused on the comparison of performances of the uni-output TCCCN (Uni-TCCCN) and multi-output (Multi-TCCCN) by near infrared diffuse reflectance spectra and their first derivative spectra of sulfaguanidine. The TCCCN models were verified with independent prediction samples by using the “cross-validation” method. The networks were used to discriminate qualified, un-qualified and counterfeit sulfaguanidines pharmaceutical powders. The results showed that single outputs network generally worked better than the multiple outputs networks, and the first derivative spectra were more suitable for the identification comparing with original diffuse reflectance spectra. With proper network parameters the pharmaceutical powders can be classified at rate of 100% in this work. Also, the effects of parameters and related problems were discussed.     

Determination of physical properties of bitumens by use of near-infrared spectroscopy with neural networks. Joint modelling of linear and non-linear parameters

The fact that bitumens behave as non-Newtonian fluids results in non-linear relationships between their near-infrared (NIR) spectra and the physico-chemical properties that define their consistency (viz. penetration and viscosity). Determining such properties using linear calibration techniques [e.g. partial least-squares regression (PLSR)] entails the previous transformation of the original variables by use of non-linear functions and employing the transformed variables to construct the models. Other properties of bitumens such as density and composition exhibit linear relationships with their NIR spectra. Artificial neural networks (ANNs) enable modelling of systems with a non-linear property-spectrum relationship; also, they allow one to determine several properties of a sample with a single model, so they are effective alternatives to linear calibration methods. In this work, the ability of ANNs simultaneously to determine both linear and non-linear parameters for bitumens without the need previously to transform the original variables was assessed. Based on the results, ANNs allow the simultaneous determination of several linear and non-linear physical properties typical of bitumens.     

Short-wave near-infrared spectroscopy analysis of major compounds in milk powder and wavelength assignment

In this study, short-wave near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy at 800–1050 nm region was investigated for the analysis of main compounds in milk powder. Through quantitative analysis, the feasibility is further demonstrated for the simultaneous measurement of fat, proteins and carbohydrate in milk powder. Two models, partial least-squares and least-squares support vector machine, were compared and utilized for regression coefficients and loading weights. The affect of standard normal variate spectral pretreatment to model performance was evaluated. Based on the resulted coefficients and loading weights, interesting wavelength regions of nutrition in milk powder are screened and the assignment of all specific wavelengths is firstly proposed in the details associated with chemical base. Instead of the whole short-wave NIR spectral data, these assigned wavelengths which can be reliably exploited were used for the content determination. Compared with other spectroscopy technique, assigned short-wave NIR spectral wavelengths did a good work. Determination coefficients for prediction are 0.981, 0.984, and 0.982, respectively for three components. The proposed wavelength assignment in the short-wave NIR region could be used for the component contents determination of milk powder, and could be as a guidance to interpret the spectra of milk powder.     

Determination of Active Components in a Natural Herb with Near Infrared Spectroscopy Based on Artificial Neural Networks

The non-linear relationships between the contents of ginsenoside Rg1, Rb2, Rd and Panax notoginseng saponins(PNS) in Panax notoginseng root herb and the near infrared(NIR) diffuse reflectance spectra of the herb were established by means of artificial neural networks(ANNs). Four three-layered perception feed-for-ward networks were trained with an error back-propagation algorithm. The significant principal components of the NIR spectral data matrix were utilized as the input of the networks. The networks architecture and parameters were selected so as to offer less prediction errors. Relative prediction errors for Rg1, Rb1, Rd and PNS obtained with the optimum ANN models were 8.99%, 6.54%, 8.29%, and 5.17%, respectively, which were superior to those obtained with PLSR methods. It is verified that ANN is a suitable approach to model this complex non-linearity. The developed method is fast, non-destructive and accurate and it provides a new efficient approach for determining the active components in the complex system of natural herbs.     

Radial basis function neural networks in non-destructive determination of compound aspirin tablets on NIR spectroscopy

The application of the second most popular artificial neural networks (ANNs), namely, the radial basis function (RBF) networks, has been developed for quantitative analysis of drugs during the last decade. In this paper, the two components (aspirin and phenacetin) were simultaneously determined in compound aspirin tablets by using near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy and RBF networks. The total database was randomly divided into a training set (50) and a testing set (17). Different preprocessing methods (standard normal variate (SNV), multiplicative scatter correction (MSC), first-derivative and second-derivative) were applied to two sets of NIR spectra of compound aspirin tablets with different concentrations of two active components and compared each other. After that, the performance of RBF learning algorithm adopted the nearest neighbor clustering algorithm (NNCA) and the criterion for selection used a cross-validation technique. Results show that using RBF networks to quantificationally analyze tablets is reliable, and the best RBF model was obtained by first-derivative spectra.     

Development of a rapid process monitoring method for dry-coated tableting process by using near-infrared spectroscopy

A nondestructive transmittance near-infrared (NIR) method for detecting off-centered cores in dry-coated (DC) tablets was developed as a monitoring system in the DC tableting process. Caffeine anhydrate was used as a core active pharmaceutical ingredient (API), and DC tablets were made by the direct compression method. NIR spectra were obtained from these intact DC tablets using the transmittance method. The reference assay was performed with HPLC. Calibration models were generated by partial least squares (PLS) regression and principal component regression (PCR) utilizing external validations. Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) of the results confirmed that NIR spectroscopy correctly detected off-centered cores in DC tablets. We formulated and used the Centering Index (CI) to evaluate the precision of core alignment and generated an NIR calibration model that could correctly predict this index. The principal component (PC) 1 loading vector of the final calibration model indicated that it could specifically detect the misalignment of tablet cores. The model also had good linearity and accuracy. The CIs of unknown sample tablets predicted by the final calibration model and those calculated through the HPLC analysis were closely parallel with each other. These results demonstrate the validity of the final calibration model and the utility of the transmittance NIR spectroscopic method developed in this study as a monitoring system in DC tableting process.     

An accurate quantitative analysis of polymorphs based on artificial neural networks

Measurement precision based on homogeneous and accurate standard samples has been reported to result in significant improvement in the sensitivity and accuracy of the quantitative analysis of polymorphic mixtures. The purpose of this study was to further improve the accuracy of the quantitation based on data processing by artificial neural networks (ANNs), using such high quality standard samples. Homogeneous powder mixtures of - and γ-forms of indomethacin (IMC) at various ratios (0–50% -form content) were subjected to X-ray powder diffractometry. The two diffraction peaks selected as the best combination in multiple linear regression (MLR) were used in the ANN with an extended Kalman filter as a training algorithm. The results obtained by ANN had better predictive accuracy at lower contents (0–5%) compared to those of MLR. ANNs for the diffraction data based on high quality standard samples provide an extremely precise and accurate quantification for polymorphic mixtures.     

中药口服固体制剂原辅料近红外光谱数据库的构建及应用

建立了中药口服固体制剂原辅料近红外(NIR)光谱数据库,采用模式识别方法研究了NIR光谱数据在物料分类和物性预测中的应用。使用便携式近红外光谱仪快速测量149批原辅料粉末的NIR漫反射光谱数据,并录入iTCM数据库。利用主成分分析(PCA)法探究NIR光谱数据对已知结构物料的分类能力,采用偏最小二乘(PLS)法研究了NIR光谱对原辅料物性参数和直接压片片剂性能的预测能力。经标准正态变量变换(SNV)+Savitzky-Golay(SG)平滑+一阶导数处理后的NIR光谱数据对微晶纤维素、乳糖、乙基纤维素、交联聚维酮和羟丙基甲基纤维素这5类辅料的区分能力较好。NIR光谱数据与原辅料粉末粒径、密度和吸湿性的相关性较强。NIR光谱信息作为物料物理性质的补充,可提高粉末直接压片片剂性能预测模型的性能。NIR光谱数据是iTCM数据库物性参数数据的补充,物性参数与NIR光谱数据的结合能更全面地表征原辅料的性质。     

ICA方法与NIR技术用于药片中活性成分含量的测定

用独立分量分析(ICA)方法提取药片近红外光谱数据矩阵的独立成分和相应的混合矩阵, 再用BP神经网络对混合矩阵和药片中活性成分的浓度矩阵进行建模, 提出了新的药片活性成分含量测定的基于独立分量分析-神经网络回归(ICA-NNR)的近红外光谱分析方法. 通过分析独立分量数和网络中间隐层的神经元数对模型性能的影响, 分别建立三类药片定量分析的最优模型. 该方法用于实测的三类药片中活性成分含量的测定, 测试样品集的化学检测值与近红外预测值的相关系数分别达到0.962, 0.980及0.979. 结果表明, 基于ICA-NNR的近红外光谱分析方法对制药业的药片进行定量分析是可行的.     

Artificial neural network for simultaneous determination of two components of compound paracetamol and diphenhydramine hydrochloride powder on NIR spectroscopy

Diffuse reflectance near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy is a technique widely used for rapid and non-destructive analysis of solid samples. A method for simultaneous analysis of the two components of compound paracetamol and diphenhydramine hydrochloride powdered drug has been developed by using artificial neural network (ANN) on near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy. An ANN containing three layers of nodes was trained. Various ANN models based on pretreated spectra (first-derivative, second-derivative and standard normal variate; SNV) were tested and compared, respectively. In the models the concentration of paracetamol and caffeine as active principles of compound paracetamol and diphenhydramine hydrochloride powder was determined simultaneously. Partial least squares regression (PLS) multivariate calibrations were also used, which were compared with ANN. The best model was obtained at first-derivative spectra. We have also discussed the parameters that affected the networks and predicted the test set (unknown) specimens. The degree of approximation, a new evaluation criteria of the network were employed, which proved the accuracy of the predicted results.     

Optical coefficient‐based multivariate calibration on near‐infrared spectroscopy

The time and expense of calibration development limit the feasibility of NIR spectroscopy for many industrial applications, with a major portion of the costs being related to creation of a sufficient set of calibration samples. Net analyte signal (NAS) and generalized least squares (GLS) pre‐processing have been proposed in the literature as methods to simplify multivariate calibration by reducing the quantity of calibration samples by orthogonalizing or shrinking interference signals. Synthetic calibration has also been reported as a method to combine interference signals with pure component spectra to generate virtual calibration models, thereby reducing the number of real calibration samples required. The goals of this paper were to (1) compare theoretical and practical differences between NAS and GLS pre‐processing and (2) explore the potential of simplified NIR calibrations, both empirical and synthetic, constructed using optical coefficient‐based signal processing on predicting chemical compositions of pharmaceutical powder mixtures. A reduced calibration dataset including only one pharmaceutical powder mixture composition and pure component spectra was used for both empirical and synthetic calibrations. Absorption and reduced scattering coefficients, obtained from spatially‐resolved spectroscopy, were used herein as interference signals in NAS/GLS pre‐processing for both calibrations. As a result, NAS and GLS were shown to be equivalent in both theoretical and practical senses. After optical coefficient‐based signal processing, simplified calibrations, both empirical and synthetic, were demonstrated to have similar model performance as generic pre‐processing methods such as SNV and derivative, while requiring fewer principal components and achieving a lower prediction error. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A journey into low-dimensional spaces with autoassociative neural networks

The compression and the visualization of the data have been always a subject of a great deal of excitement. Since multidimensional data sets are difficult to interpret and visualize, much of the attention is drawn how to compress them efficiently. Usually, the compression of dimensionality is considered as the first step of exploratory data analysis. Here, we focus our attention on autoassociative neural networks (ANNs), which in a very elegant manner provide data compression and visualization. ANNs can deal with linear and nonlinear correlation among variables, what makes them a very powerful tool in exploratory data analysis. In the literature, ANNs are often referred as nonlinear principal component analysis (PCA), and due to their specific structure they are also known as bottleneck neural networks. In this paper, ANNs are discussed in details. Different training modes are described and illustrated on real example. The usefulness of ANNs for nonlinear data compression and visualization purposes is proven with the aid of chemical data sets, being the subject of analysis. The comparison of ANNs with well-known PCA is also presented.     

Determination of indomethacin polymorphic contents by chemometric near-infrared spectroscopy and conventional powder X-ray diffractometry

A chemoinfometric method for the quantitative determination of the crystal content of indomethacin (IMC) polymorphs, based on Fourier-transform near-infrared (FT-NIR) spectroscopy, was established. A direct comparison of the data with those collected using the conventional powder X-ray diffraction method was performed. Pure alpha and gamma forms of IMC were prepared using published methods. Powder X-ray diffraction profiles and NIR spectra were recorded for six kinds of standard material with various contents of the gamma form of IMC. Principal component regression (PCR) analyses were performed on the basis of the normalized NIR spectral sets of standard samples with known contents of the gamma form of IMC. A calibration equation was determined to minimize the root mean square error of the prediction. The predicted gamma form contents were reproducible and had a relatively small standard deviation. The values of the gamma form contents predicted by the two methods were in close agreement. The results indicated that NIR spectroscopy provides an accurate quantitative analysis of crystallinity in polymorphs compared with the results obtained by conventional powder X-ray diffractometry.