A novel colloidal deposition method to prepare copper nanoparticles/polystyrene nanocomposite with antibacterial activity and its comparison to the liquid-phase in situ reduction method

Abstract

Here, we study a simple and effective colloidal deposition method (D) to synthesize a type of core–shell structure composed of copper nanoparticles/polystyrene (CuNPs/PS) microsphere nanocomposite. CuNPs/PS nanocomposite can effectively avoid the agglomeration and oxidation of CuNPs, while retaining its original antibacterial ability, prolonging the service life of antibacterial materials and improving the practical value of Copper in the antibacterial field. The CuNPs with controllable size and excellent stability are successfully synthesized by the double-template method using polyvinylpyrrolidone–sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate (PVP–SDBS) as template. Compared to the traditional in situ reduction method (R), the novel colloidal deposition method (D) does not involve any surface pretreatment of the PS microspheres, and the size of the CuNPs loaded on the surface of the support PS microspheres can be conveniently controlled. Therefore, we believe that this method is relatively simple and easy to operate, and it is more practical. In addition, the CuNPs/PS (D) nanocomposite has better antibacterial activity and oxidation resistance than the CuNPs/PS (R) nanocomposite, the symbols D and R mean the CuNPs/PS prepared by the novel colloidal deposition method and the liquid-phase in situ reduction method, respectively. Moreover, both the synthesis mechanism of the double-template method and the mechanism for the superiority of colloidal deposition method are examined. The findings of this study provide new ideas for controllably loading metal nanoparticles on polymeric microspheres.