CBI Colloquium with Dr. Sudeshna Roy

Title: From Ice to Pores: Shaping Drug Stability through Freezing and Annealing

Abstract
Freeze-drying is widely used to stabilise modern medicines, but the process is slow, energy‑intensive and still relies heavily on trial and error in development. In this talk, a simple sugar–water system is used to demonstrate how the freezing process and subsequent low-temperature treatment determine the invisible pore network through which ice later escapes as vapour. Combining in‑situ microscopy experiments with tailored computer simulations, the work tracks how ice crystals grow, merge and rearrange during freezing and annealing, and how this reshapes the porous structure. The results provide practical rules for linking process conditions to pore size and connectivity, and demonstrate how digital models can complement experiments to design more robust, efficient freeze‑drying cycles.

CV
Dr. Sudeshna Roy is Privatdozentin at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen–Nürnberg (FAU) and Manager for Process Simulation at Daiichi Sankyo Europe GmbH. She received her PhD from the University of Twente in 2018 and completed her habilitation at FAU in 2025. After her PhD, she held postdoctoral positions at Pennsylvania State University, Syracuse University (USA), and Heriot-Watt University (UK). Her research focuses on granular materials, particle-based simulation methods, and pharmaceutical process modeling, particularly freeze-drying and formulation processes. She has authored multiple peer-reviewed publications and collaborates closely with both academia and industry.