Engineering Poly‐Crystalline Hydroxyapatite Through Curcumin‐Salicylic Acid Surface Functionalization for Enhanced Osteoblast Applications

ABSTRACT Hydroxyapatite (HAP) nanopowders were prepared by hydrothermal synthesis using varying concentrations of curcumin and salicylic acid as organic modifiers. XRD demonstrated the synthesis of phase‐pure, high‐crystallinity HAP, and that the organic additives were effective in refining the crystallite size to 14.23–17.22 nm. SEM and particle size analysis showed that the combined action of curcumin and salicylic acid CS‐1 produced uniform and spherical nanoparticles with a narrow size distribution of 106–224 nm and a large decrease in aggregation as opposed to samples with individual additives. HRTEM and SAED further confirmed the phase's good crystallinity and purity. The in vitro cytotoxicity analysis of the MG‐63 osteoblast cells confirmed high biocompatibility, and cell viability was also high (98.37 and 95.58) at 12.5 μg/mL and at the highest concentration of 200 μg/mL (84.08 and 79.66) after 24 and 72 h.