High storage capacity of curcumin loaded onto hollow mesoporous silica nanoparticles prepared via improved hard-templating method optimized by Taguchi DoE

The ability of drug carriers, such as silica nanoparticles, to store high-concentrated bioactive compounds like curcumin within their mesoporous structure is technologically and economically advantageous to suppress their amount administered to the human body as little as possible. In this study, we succeeded in synthesizing and formulating a high storage capacity of curcumin loaded onto hollow mesoporous sil-ica (HMS) nanoparticles via an improved hard-templating method which was in tandem with Taguchi design of optimization. The amount of silica precursor (TEOS), ethanol to water ratio, and pH condition are three critical variables used to optimally design nine HMS nanoparticles following the Taguchi approach. The textural properties, including surface area, pore-volume, pore size, hydrodynamic particle size, zeta-potential, and morphology, of the HMS nanoparticles, were discussed in this report. The cur-cumin adsorption study calculated following Langmuir and Dubinin Redushkevich isotherm models reveals the robustness of Taguchi DoE in providing a contribution of each variable toward adsorption capacity value, in which the amount of silica precursor has the highest contribution value. Moreover, the signal-to-noise (SN) ratio analysis, a feature of Taguchi DoE, indicates that the level 1 of TEOS, level 1 of ethanol to water ratio, and level 3 of pH are the optimal composition to construct HMS nanoparticles with high storage capacity reaching 183.08 mg g(-1). The involvement of Taguchi DoE in the synthesis of HMS nanoparticles is not only able to provide the optimal number of procedures but also afford a better explanation of the contribution of each synthesis variable. Moreover, our study is capable to explain the relation of each variable on determining the properties of HMS nanoparticles which are beneficial in designing of effective properties of materials. (C) 2021 Karabuk University. Publishing services by Elsevier B.V.

Automated summary

This study successfully synthesized and formulated high storage capacity curcumin loaded onto hollow mesoporous silica nanoparticles through an improved hard-templating method and optimization using Taguchi design. The textural properties and curcumin adsorption study revealed the contribution of each variable towards adsorption capacity, leading to the optimal composition for constructing high storage capacity HMS nanoparticles.