Fabrication of zinc/silver binary nanoparticles, their enhanced microbial and adsorbing properties

Abstract

Monometallic ZnO nanoparticles were prepared by hydrolysis of zinc acetate with ammonium hydroxide solution. Bimetallic zinc-silver nanoparticles (ZnO-AgNPs) were prepared using metal displacement galvanic cell reaction in presence of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB). The optical and photo-physical properties of both NPs were determined. Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) intensity of ZnO-AgNPs depends on the ratio of metal salt precursors and other experimental conditions. The optical band gap (2.98 eV), agglomeration number (26819.92), and molar concentration (1.14 × 10−4 mol/liter) of ZnO-AgNPs were determined. Langmuir adsorption monolayer, Freundlich, intraparticles diffusion and multilayer adsorption isotherms used for the determination of maximum adsorption efficiency and adsorption isotherm parameters to the removal of safranin dye from an aqueous solution. The kinetics of safranin removal has also been discussed with pseudo-first order, pseudo-second order, intraparticle diffusion and multilayer kinetic models. The antibacterial and antifungal activities of ZnO, Ag and ZnO-AgNPs were determined against human pathogens using growth kinetic and disk diffusion methods. The concentrations of ZnO-AgNPs have significant effect on the bacterial growth kinetics. The death rate constants increase with increasing the NPs concentrations. It has been found that the ZnO-AgNPs hold higher microbial activities than that of monometallic counterpart, ZnO and AgNPs. Mechanism of bacterial growth and death was discussed.