SAS Institute. The Power to Know

Getting Started with the SAS(R) 9.2 ADX Interface for Design of Experiments


Full Factorial Designs

Experimental Objective

The following example is based on a case study described by Fossceco (1999). A pharmaceutical manufacturer formulates tablets by mixing excipients with active ingredients and processing this mixture. The mixture is passed through an extruder to make spaghetti-like strands, which are spheronized to create small pellets and then compressed into tablet form. An experiment is performed to maximize the yield (YIELD) and assure that the mean particle size (MPS) is about 1000 microns.


The factors represent different steps in the manufacturing process as shown in Table 3.1.

Table 3.1: Factors of the Tablet Formulation Example
Type Name Low High Description
FactorFLUID90115Moisture content (%)
 MIX1545Mixing time (min)
 EXTRUDER36132Extruder speed (rpm)
 SCREEN0.61.0Spheronizing screen size (mm)
 RESID25Residence time (min)
 DISK450900Disk speed (rpm)
ResponseYIELD  Drug yield (%)
 MPS  Mean particle size (microns)

Task List