Abstract
Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are widely used as engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) in many advanced nanotechnologies, due to their versatile, easy and cheap preparations combined with peculiar chemical-physical properties. Their increased production and integration in environmental applications including water treatment raise concerns for their impact on humans and the environment. An eco-design strategy that makes it possible to combine the best material performances with no risk for the natural ecosystems and living beings has been recently proposed. This review envisages potential hybrid solutions of AgNPs for water pollution monitoring and remediation to satisfy their successful, environmentally safe (ecosafe) application. Being extremely efficient in pollutants sensing and degradation, their ecosafe application can be achieved in combination with polymeric-based materials, especially with cellulose, by following an eco-design approach. In fact, (AgNPs)–cellulose hybrids have the double advantage of being easily produced using recycled material, with low costs and possible reuse, and of being ecosafe, if properly designed. An updated view of the use and prospects of these advanced hybrids AgNP-based materials is provided, which will surely speed their environmental application with consequent significant economic and environmental impact.
Highlights
IntroductionEngineered nanomaterials (ENMs) are typically defined as materials smaller than 100 nm in at least one dimension, and they have specific surface functionalizations and size-dependent properties, such as high reactivity and large surface-to-volume ratio, that satisfy their wide range of applications, including in sensing [1,2,3,4,5], optics [6,7,8,9,10], energy [11,12,13,14,15], catalysis [16,17,18,19], biotechnology [20,21,22,23,24] and so on
This review envisages potential solutions of AgNPs in water pollution monitoring and remediation, with particular emphasis on their environmentally safe application. It starts from an (i) updated overview on the incredible features of AgNPs and their easy, cheap and versatile synthesis, moves to (ii) the ecosafety concept by highlighting the relevance of assessing their environmental impact in terms of toxicity for aquatic species achieved by an eco-design approach, and (iii) provides potential advanced hybrids solutions such as cellulose–AgNP composites, which allow synergistic and eco-friendly actions
This review was conceived with the awareness that only a multidisciplinary and integrated approach among biological, chemical, and engineering visions allows a real deepening of the topic of new hybrid ecosafe solutions for water pollution monitoring and treatment and an enrichment that goes beyond the simple collection and proposal of recent articles
Summary
Engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) are typically defined as materials smaller than 100 nm in at least one dimension, and they have specific surface functionalizations and size-dependent properties, such as high reactivity and large surface-to-volume ratio, that satisfy their wide range of applications, including in sensing [1,2,3,4,5], optics [6,7,8,9,10], energy [11,12,13,14,15], catalysis [16,17,18,19], biotechnology [20,21,22,23,24] and so on. Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have aroused great interest due to their low cost, synthetic versatility, and chemical-physical properties For this reason, they are already widely used and present in various commercial products, often as hybrid compounds, that can be responsive to external stimuli [25,26,27,28,29,30]. This review envisages potential solutions of AgNPs in water pollution monitoring and remediation, with particular emphasis on their environmentally safe application It starts from an (i) updated overview on the incredible features of AgNPs and their easy, cheap and versatile synthesis, moves to (ii) the ecosafety concept by highlighting the relevance of assessing their environmental impact in terms of toxicity for aquatic species achieved by an eco-design approach, and (iii) provides potential advanced hybrids solutions such as cellulose–AgNP composites, which allow synergistic and eco-friendly actions. This review was conceived with the awareness that only a multidisciplinary and integrated approach among biological, chemical, and engineering visions allows a real deepening of the topic of new hybrid ecosafe solutions for water pollution monitoring and treatment and an enrichment that goes beyond the simple collection and proposal of recent articles
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