Antibacterial and Antifungal Activity of Metal Oxides Nanoparticles Coated onto Cotton Fibers

Abstract

Background: Increasing microbial resistance have emerged as a major challenge to the healthcare systems and despite the wide range of the available antimicrobial therapies, microbial infections remain high, due to the ability of these organisms to develop resistance to virtually all antimicrobial therapies. New strategies are needed to control these microbial infections. Metal oxides nanoparticles coated onto cotton fibers represent an important and novel tool due to its excellent antimicrobial activity against pathogenic microbes which are responsible for “Nosocomial infections”. Objectives: The main objective of this study is to investigate and study the antibacterial and antifungal activity of zinc oxide (ZnO) and copper oxide (CuO) nanoparticles coated onto cotton fibers. Methodology: CuO-NPs and ZnO-NPs were synthesized in absence\ presence of different surfactants and deposited on\into 100% cotton fibers using ultrasonic irradiation. The optical structure and morphology of the coated cotton fabrics were examined by UV, FTIR, XRD, SEM, XPS and TGA analysis. Wash durability test was executed in order to investigate the stability of NPs. The efficacy of the different surfactants in minimizing the leaching of the adsorbed NPs and the remaining concentration of the NPs on the washed cotton fabric were determined using Atomic Absorption Spectrometer (AAS). Antibacterial and antifungal activities of ZnO-NPs and CuO-NPs coated fabrics were investigated against different pathogenic bacterial and fungal species and compared with uncoated cotton material. Results: Our results showed that CuO-NPs and ZnO-NPs-coated cottons exhibited good antimicrobial activity, where CuO-NPs coated cotton has greater antimicrobial activity against Escherichia coli and ZnO-NPs-coated cotton has greater activity against Staphylococcus aureus and this activity was significantly retained after several washings. Besides, both MO-NPs showed greater inhibitory activity against the bacterial species than the fungal species. It was also shown that surfactants was used to preserve a homogeneous distribution and a uniform ordering of nanoparticles on the surface of the cotton fabrics. In addition, Sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS), was the most effective surfactant in minimizing the leaching of both MO-NPs and it helped in getting the smallest size for both metal oxides. Also, our results revealed that the microbial reduction percentage (%) decreased as the number of washing cycles increased. Conclusion: It is concluded that MO-NPs coated cotton fabrics were prepared successfully. In addition, the different surfactants were able to stabilize the adsorbed NPs onto the surface of the cotton. Moreover, the coated cotton exhibited good antimicrobial activity against all the tested organisms.