Determination and differentiation of surface and bound water in drug substances by near infrared spectroscopy.

Near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) was utilized to determine the water content during the drying of a drug substance with Karl Fisher titration as the reference measurement. NIRS calibration models were built with Partial Least Squares (PLS) regression based on spectral region of 1822-1948 nm for samples with 1-40% (w/w) water from five batches. A standard error of prediction (SEP) of 1.