A Novel Eco-friendly Method of Using Red Algae (Laurencia papillosa) to Synthesize Gold Nanoprisms

Abstract

This is the first report on a rapid green synthesis of gold nanoparticles (GNPs) using red algae (Laurencia papillosa). The green synthesis of eco-friendly nanoparticles is of a great interest in nanoscience for biomedical applications and specifically for clinical diagnostic applications. GNPs especially nanoprism represents a new advanced tool to study cell function and useful in optoelectronics, in developing a drug delivery system to control plant virus diseases and in nanomedicine. Conventional physical and chemical methods have been developed for the synthesis of metal nanoparticles, but these methods are expensive and require the use of toxic and aggressive chemicals. In this paper, it is demonstrated that a rapid, low coast and eco-friendly method for synthesis of gold nanospheres and its conversion into gold nanoprisms has been developed. The method involves using water solvent extract of L. papillosa as a reducing agent. Nanoscopy and computational analysis revealed that the nanoprism and other different morphologies were obtained just by varying the concentration molarity of tetrachloauric acid (HAuCl4), keeping the concentration of pure algal extract (PAE) constant. In the same time, we perform ImageJ analyses for the size distribution of TEM images. The best concentration of AuCl4 was 5 mM and best concentration of the red algae extract was at 0.05 g/ml. The functional groups responsible for conversion of nanosphere into nanoprism were NH and OH groups found in the contents of the red algae extract. The as-synthesized gold nanoprisms were characterized by several physicochemical techniques. The nanoprisms are single crystalline, whose basal plates surface are atomically flat 111 planes. We anticipate our results to be a starting point for more applications in medicine, plant virus diseases, and industrial technology.