title: Assessment of the relative performance of a confined impinging jets mixer and a multi-inlet vortex mixer for curcumin nanoparticle production.
abstract: The relative performance of two specially designed mixers for nanoparticle production, namely, two-stream confined impinging jets with dilution mixer (CIJ-D-M) and four-stream multi-inlet vortex mixer (MIVM), was evaluated using the model compound, curcumin (CUR), under defined conditions of varying mixing rate and organic solvent. In the absence of turbulent fluctuations, higher mixing rate tended to generate finer particles. Among the three water-miscible organic solvents tested, acetone afforded the smallest particle size and the narrowest particle size distribution. Both mixers were capable of reproducibly fabricating CUR nanoparticles with particle size below 100 nm and high encapsulation efficiency (>99.9%). Specifically, CIJ-D-M yielded nanoparticles with smaller size and polydispersity index while the particles obtained by the MIVM displayed better short-term stability. In addition, CIJ-D-M tended to produce a mixture of irregular nanoaggregates and primary nanoparticles while roughly spherical nanoparticles were generated with the MIVM. The observed particle size and morphological differences could be attributed to the differences in the configuration of the mixing chamber and the related mixing order.
authors.affiliation: School of Pharmacy, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Sha Tin, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Shing Fung
authors.initials: SF
authors.lastname: Chow
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, College of Pharmacy, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
authors.forename: Changquan Calvin
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.affiliation: School of Pharmacy, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Sha Tin, Hong Kong. Electronic address: albert-chow@cuhk.edu.hk.
authors.forename: Albert Hee Lum
authors.initials: AH
authors.lastname: Chow
mesh_terms: D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid; D003474:Curcumin / Q000737:chemistry*; D008027:Light; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D053758:Nanoparticles; D012542:Scattering, Radiation
chemical_list: D003474:Curcumin
keywords: Confined impinging jets with dilution mixer; Curcumin; Diffusion; Flash nanoprecipitation; Mixing; Multi-inlet vortex mixer; Nanoparticles