Photocatalytic and antimicrobial activity of electrospun ZnO:Ag nanostructures

Abstract

Abstract ZnO loaded with Ag nanostructured materials of different doping ratio (0.1, 0.5, 1 and 2%) were obtained using electrospinning method. Electrospun solutions used in the manufacture of these fibers before calcination contain a mixture composed of a polymer (polyvinylpyrrolidone), zinc acetate and various ratios of Ag nitrate. Thus, the materials obtained were then subjected to thermal treatment at 500 °C for 2 h. To confirm the structural and morphological characteristics and the elemental composition of these ZnO:Ag nanostructured materials X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy SEM coupled with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) were used. XRD measurements reveal the hexagonal wurtzite crystalline structure of Ag loaded ZnO materials. This study brings some cognitive understating and additional information regarding the influence of Ag doping. The novelty of this study relies on the electrospinning technique in preparing the materials, which highly enhances the photocatalytic activity. The authors reported that the Ag loaded concentration plays an important role in photocatalytic performance, namely 1% is optimal doping dosage to achieve a maximum color removal efficiency of ∼96% for the degradation of Amaranth dye (25 mg/L) under UV-light irradiation. These materials showed high efficiency for Amaranth dye degradation under UV irradiation and at low amount of catalyst dosage (0.166 g/L). An important aspect which emerging from this study is the ability of prepared materials to undergo photodegradation under visible light with good results. In addition, the ceramic nanostructured materials proved to have antimicrobial activity against Gram-positive (Staphylococcus aureus), Gram-negative (Escherichia coli) and yeast (Candida albicans) strains.