Preparation and Characterization of Bovine Serum Albumin Nanoparticles of Curcumin using a Chemometric Approach

Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) has been presupposed to be a versatile protein polymer for targeted drug delivery. BSA nanoparticles can lead to passive targeting of drugs to the inflamed joint via the Enhanced Permeability and Retention (EPR) effect and due to their specific affinity towards the inflamed joint because of the inadequacy of protein in the affected region. Hence, the aim of the study was to develop BSA nanoparticles loading curcumin (BSA_CUR_NPs) by nanoparticle albuminbound technology and its optimization was conducted by 33 Box Behnken Design (BBD) in order to achieve the desired particle size and entrapment efficiency. Further, the optimised nanoparticles were also assessed for polydispersity index, zeta potential, total drug content, and in-vitro drug release study. The response surface plots and equations generated by BBD predicted the relationship between variables under study. The optimised formulation C12 was found to have a particle size of 207.1 ± 1.36nm, PDI of 0.138 ± 0.03, entrapment efficiency of 75.04 ± 0.06 %, total drug content of 91.40 ± 0.08% and zeta potential of -32.9mV. The optimised nanoparticles exhibited good sustained release for up to 8 days. The use of a chemometric approach led to the development of BSA_CUR_NPs with the desired characteristics with a less experimental procedure. Therefore, it presents an important model for producing the nanoparticles of the desired characteristics using albumin as a polymer for the enhanced and sustained delivery of loaded drugs to the inflamed joint.