Curcumin-loaded nanostructured lipid carriers (NLCs) for nasal administration: design, characterization, and <i>in vivo</i> study

Cancer nanotherapeutics is beginning to overwhelm the global research and viewed to be the revolutionary treatment regime in the medical field. This investigation describes the development of a stable nanostructured lipid carrier (NLC) system as a carrier for curcumin (CRM). The CRM-loaded NLC developed as a particle with the size of 146.8 nm, a polydispersity index of 0.18, an entrapment efficiency (EE) of 90.86%, and the zeta potential (ZP) of -21.4 mV. Besides, the increased cytotoxicity of CRM-NLC than that of CRM to astrocytoma-glioblastoma cell line (U373MG) in the cancer cell lines was observed. Results of biodistribution studies showed higher drug concentration in brain after intranasal administration of NLCs than PDS. The results of the study also suggest that CRM-NLC is a promising drug delivery system for brain cancer therapy.