Gelatin–Gold Nanoparticles as an Ideal Candidate for Curcumin Drug Delivery: Experimental and DFT Studies

In this study, gold nanoparticles (GNPs) were first synthesized and then coated with gelatin by using a straightforward method. Subsequently, the resulted nanocomposite was used as curcumin drug carriers. The principal aim of the study is to determine the most appropriate size of GNPs that offers the highest yield for curcumin drug delivering. Various methods were utilized to characterize the synthesized GNPs including UV–Vis spectrophotometry, dynamic light scattering (DLS), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. Furthermore, since the coating of GNPs with gelatin is an important issue in the delivery system, we have persuaded to investigate the electronic structure of gelatin-GNPs complex using density functional theory (DFT) method. The experimental results clearly demonstrates that the largest GNPs (100 nm) exhibit the highest Encapsulation Efficiency (EE). In addition, studying the release profile of curcumin at two different pH values (7.4 and 5.4) at 37 °C for 48 h revealed that the amount of drug released at pH 5.4 is greater than that of pH 7.4 and also the release rate is slow.