Eco-Friendly Synthesis of Silver Nanoparticles by Using Moringa oleifera Leaf Extract as Reducing Agent and Their Catalytic Activity with MB Dye

Abstract

The development of biologically inspired experimental processes for the synthesis of nanoparticles is evolving into an important branch of nanotechnology. This study reports the synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) using Moringa oleifera leaves of aqueous solution as a potential reducing as well as stabilizing agent with the help of 8 mM silver nitrate solution at 2.5% leaf concentration. It also examines phytochemical screening to excavate the most important constituents like phenols, carbohydrates, proteins, tannins, alkaloids, flavonoids, steroids, glycosides, and diterpenes, degradation of methylene blue (MB) dye using biologically synthesized AgNPs. The aqueous leaves extract was added to silver nitrate solution; the color of the reaction medium was changed from pale yellow to brown that indicates reduction of silver ions to AgNPs. Thus, synthesized AgNPs were characterized by UV-Vis spectrophotometer that showed an absorption peak at 460 nm. The photocatalytic activity of the synthesized AgNPs was observed to have potential efficacy to degrade methylene blue (MB) dye at room conditions. This was confirmed by the decrease in maximum absorbance of MB dye with respect to time using UV-Vis spectrophotometer. The bio-synthesized AgNPs effectively degraded nearly 73.11% MB with M. oleifera AgNPs at 4 hours of exposure time.