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Experimental Design
Advantages of Experimental Design
Experimental design in formulation gives many benefits in efficiency, creativity and rigour:
Creativity in Design
The process is also conducive to creative thinking — preconceptions are inevitably challenged when mapping the possible formulation space using factorial designs.
Statistical Methods
The construction of appropriate statistical mathematical models at the various stages of the process may easily permit optimisation of a formulation against desired criteria using, for example, the technique of Response Surface Methodology.
Synergy or Antagonism?
The possibility of interactions between the components of a formulation can be explicitly taken into account. These interactions may be beneficial, enhancing the performance of the formulation (synergistic) or undesirable, reducing the performance of the formulation (antagonistic).
Cost Savings
The improvements in experimental economy lead directly to associated cost-savings.
Our Experience
Our Senior Consultant in this area (Dr Kenneth Rabone) has used statistical methodology over two decades in Research and Development for experimentation in physical chemistry, in microbiology and in the formulation of a variety of classes of products including hard surface and hygienic cleaners. He has received formal training from the Statistics for Industry group.
As a formulation chemist he has implicit knowledge of the problems of formulation having been involved with every stage of the process from the bench to the pilot plant. We believe this gives our approach a significant advantage over calling in a statistician (with seemingly endless briefings), often to carry out a post mortem on a failed experiment.
For more comments and views on experimental design, see this article.
Statistical Software for Experimental Design
The application of experimental design and subsequent data analysis is greatly facilitated by modern statistical software. Good user-friendly statistical software with a flexible graphical user interface is unfortunately rare and the cost of a licence can be prohibitively expensive for a SME. We can advise on cost-effective software solutions and help develop a bespoke system to meet your experimental design and analysis requirements that will take your formulations to the next level.
The Process
An outline of a typical process is shown here in the form of a Mind Map (click for PDF version).
