Fighting Organized Drug Crime

Counterfeit medicines. Falsified medicines. Drugs of abuse. Recreational drugs. Illegal narcotics. Steroids.

Not only are these substances extremely bad for health, taking thousands of lives every year, they are equally bad for the economy, tying up hundreds of billions of Euros/Dollars/Pounds/Pesos, etc. Yet, despite the frenzied response from governments worldwide, the reality is business as usual: enormous profits for the criminals who manufacture and distribute counterfeit medicines and controlled substances.

What can analytical scientists do to make the fight-back that little bit more effective? One way is to simplify identification of the substances involved. That means more effectively, quickly and cheaply sorting through an enormous range of structures that are compositionally often very complex and anywhere between purely natural to 100 percent synthetic. The diversity of chemistry and source challenges scientists to look across the boundaries of disciplines to solve the analytical problem. Usually, forensic and pharmaceutical laboratories combine several techniques, of which the most common are liquid/gas chromatography, mass spectrometry (including combinations) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. More recently, optical spectrometry techniques like near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and Raman spectroscopy have also gained a substantial role in the identification of illegal products.

Here, I want to make the case for the analytical power of X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray fluorescence (XRF) spectrometry. The role for X-ray analysis has, to date, been remarkably limited; yet it can provide quick and unambiguous screening and identification of counterfeit drugs and illegal narcotics. 

Take counterfeit drugs: modern XRD instruments are capable of highly accurate and robust identification of a wide variety of polymorphs in active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). They can discriminate among complex systems including hydrates, solvates, salts and co-crystals, which characterize solid-state pharmaceutical products (and controlled substances). Subtle variations in the final product, such as quantities of APIs and excipients, granulation, tablets, coatings and other dosage forms can all be detected non-destructively using current multi-purpose XRD with 1D, 2D and 3D (computed tomography) detection. Blister-packaged drugs can even be analyzed within their wrappings, checking for authenticity, thereby leaving the product “as is”. Evidence of adulteration will be valid in court, while the original material is still available for other analytical techniques to support the results.

XRD is listed as a Category A technique in the latest (2011) recommendation document from the SWGDRUG (Scientific Working Group for the Analysis of Seized Drugs) meaning the “highest discriminating power” (1). The X-ray analysis company that I work for, PANalytical, will soon launch a unique XRD database consisting primarily of controlled substances, which was developed with data from the Drug Analysis Services of Health Canada. It contains a wide variety of illegal narcotics, steroids, clandestine drug products, related pharmaceuticals and precursors, that will support forensic, criminal investigation and customs laboratories in their challenging analysis tasks. Professional principal component analysis (PCA)-based clustering analysis even allows the origin of the material to be determined. 

When it comes to fast and highly reproducible elemental analysis, XRF has a lot to offer to the pharmaceutical and forensic arenas. Apart from its high sensitivity for metallic residues in medicine, such as catalysts and impurities, new fingerprint methods are efficient in screening for counterfeits and identifying controlled substances. Sample preparation, if required at all, is very simple. Several studies have illustrated the capability of discriminating the place of origin of foods (2, 3) and plants (4), based on very subtle differences in trace element footprints, which is equally applicable to seized counterfeits and drugs.

The time has come for forensic labs to open their doors to XRD and XRF. It’s a step in the right direction towards fighting drug crime.