Curcumin (CUR) is one natural bioactive compound acknowledged
for
diverse therapeutic activities, but its use is hindered by its poor
bioavailability, fast metabolism, and susceptibility to pH variations
and light exposure. Thus, the encapsulation in poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid), or PLGA, has been successfully used to
protect and enhance CUR absorption in the organism, making CUR-loaded
PLGA nanoparticles (NPs) promising drug delivery systems. However,
few studies have focused beyond CUR bioavailability, on the environmental
variables involved in the encapsulation process, and whether they
could help obtain NPs of superior performance. Our study evaluated
pH (3.0 or 7.0), temperature (15 or 35 °C), light exposure, and
inert atmosphere (N2) incidence in the encapsulation of
CUR. The best outcome was at pH 3.0, 15 °C, without light incidence,
and without N2 usage. This best nanoformulation showed
NP size, zeta potential, and encapsulation efficiency (EE) of 297
nm, −21 mV, and 72%, respectively. Moreover, the CUR in vitro release at pH values 5.5 and 7.4 suggested different
potential applications for these NPs, one of which was demonstrated
by the effective inhibition of multiple bacteria (i.e., Gram-negative, Gram-positive, and multi-resistant) in the minimal
inhibition concentration assay. Besides, statistical analyses confirmed
a significant impact of temperature on the NP size; in addition, temperature,
light, and N2 affected the EE of CUR. Thus, the selection
and control of process variables resulted in higher CUR encapsulation
and customizable outcomes, ultimately enabling more economical processes
and providing future scale-up guidelines.
