Metallic Nanoparticles as Alternative Antimicrobials

Submit Manuscript | http://medcraveonline.com treating these and other bacterial infections currently exist; there is still an essential need for new and improved approaches for bacterial destruction. Nanomedicine is one approach to overcome challenges of conventional drug delivery systems based on the development and fabrication of nanostructures. Various types of nanoparticulate systems have been tried as potential drug delivery systems, containing metal nanoparticles, biodegradable polymeric nanoparticles, nanogels, solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN), nanoliposomes [4]. Out of these all, inorganic metallic nanoparticles have received increasing attention due to their high stability [5]. Nanoparticles (NPs) are typically no greater than 100 nm in size and their biocidal effectiveness is recommended to be due to a combined effect of their smaller size and high surface-tovolume ratio, which facilitate intimate interactions on microbial membranes [6]. Most used metal oxide nanoparticle include silver (Ag), iron oxide (Fe3O4), titanium oxide (TiO2), copper oxide (CuO), and zinc oxide (ZnO) [7]. Anti-microbial properties of Metal oxide nanoparticles exhibit through reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation. The deterioration of Gram-negative bacteria (E. coli) and Gram-positive bacteria (S. aureus) with TiO2 and Ni doped TiO2 nanoparticle was investigated in the absence and presence of irradiation by [8]. Antibacterial activities of iron oxide nanoparticles were reported against Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Serratia marcescens by [9]. The results suggested by [10] that the use of ZnO NPs as an efficient fungicide in agricultural and food safety applications. They investigated activity of zinc oxide nanoparticles against two pathogenic fungi (Botrytis cinerea and Penicillium expansum). In this research, TiO2, ZnO and ZVI nanoparticles were prepared and their potentiality to inhibit growth of various microbes was assessed. The synthesized nanoparticles were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The antimicrobial effect of three nanoparticles against Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococuus aureus & fungi Aspergillus niger was evaluated.