THAMAR ALMUSSAWY, NIBRAS YAHYA ABDULLA, GHSAQ M. ALHAMDANI AND S. M. THAHAB
Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials Research Unit (NAMRU), Faculty of Engineering, University of Kufa, Najaf, Iraq
*(e-mail : Sabah.alabboodi@uokufa.edu.iq; Mobile : 009647703996492)
(Received : December 4, 2019; Accepted : February 8, 2020)
ABSTRACT
Multi-drug resistant bacterial species are responsible for an increasing number of life threatening diseases around the globe. To overcome this problem, there is a growing need to develop new alternative therapeutic
approaches. Nanotechnology has provided a set of tools, especially nanoparticles with antimicrobial characteristics to be invested for medical and industrial applications. Recently, metals and metal oxides
nano-scaled materials represent important alternative antimicrobial agents. In this work, PVP/ZnO NPs, PVP/Ag NPs and PVP/ZnO/Ag nanocomposites and the prepared PVP/Ag NPs nanofibers by electrospinning
method were utilized to evaluate the antibacterial activity. The anti-bacterial activity was investigated against gram-positive (S. aureus and K. pneumonia) and gram-negative E. coli cultures by simple plate count method. The antibacterial behaviour showed that the Ag nanoparticles enhanced the antibacterial effect of PVP/ZnO nanocomposites. Hence, bimetallic nanofibers of PVP/ZnO/Ag could be of a great interest than the single metal nanomaterial-loaded nanofibres in inhibiting the growth of bacteria.
Key words : Antibacterial, nanofibers, PVP, Zinc Oxide nanoparticle, silver nanoparticles