Fabrication and characterization of sunflower protein isolate nanoparticles, and their potential for encapsulation and sustainable release of curcumin.

In this research, first, the effects of two desolvating agents (ethanol and methanol) at three temperature values (4, 25, and 50 °C) on the fabrication of sunflower protein isolate (SnPI) nanoparticles were studied using a desolvation method. Second, the ability of the nanoparticles to encapsulate curcumin was investigated. Results showed that ethanol led to smaller nanoparticles compared to methanol as the desolvating agent at 4 and 50 °C. However, at 25 °C, ethanol formed the most uniform nanoparticles with the lowest polydispersity index (0.188 ± 0.091) and particle size of 174.64 ± 30.61 nm. The encapsulation efficiency was in the range of 39.1 to 95.4% according to the fabrication condition and curcumin-to-protein mass ratio. A biphasic trend of curcumin release from nanoparticles was observed; in which, over 50% of curcumin was released from the curcumin-loaded nanoparticles in the first 2 h, which is attributed to the burst effect of the protein matrix.