Vinča Institute of Nuclear Sciences, University of Belgrade , P.O. Box 522, 11001 Belgrade, Serbia.
ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2015 Jan 28;7(3):1955-66. doi: 10.1021/am507746m. Epub 2015 Jan 15.
This study explores different mechanisms of antimicrobial action by designing hybrid nanomaterials that provide a new approach in the fight against resistant microbes. Here, we present a cheap copper-polyaniline (Cu-PANI) nanocomposite material with enhanced antimicrobial properties, prepared by simple in situ polymerization method, when polymer and metal nanoparticles are produced simultaneously. The copper nanoparticles (CuNPs) are uniformly dispersed in the polymer and have a narrow size distribution (dav = 6 nm). We found that CuNPs and PANI act synergistically against three strains, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, and Candida albicans, and resulting nanocomposite exhibits higher antimicrobial activity than any component acting alone. Before using the colony counting method to quantify its time and concentration antimicrobial activity, different techniques (UV-visible spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy, scanning electron microscope, field emission scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectrophotometry, and inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry) were used to identify the optical, structural, and chemical aspects of the formed Cu-PANI nanocomposite. The antimicrobial activity of this nanocomposite shows that the microbial growth has been fully inhibited; moreover, some of the tested microbes were killed. Atomic force microscopy revealed dramatic changes in morphology of tested cells due to disruption of their cell wall integrity after incubation with Cu-PANI nanocomposite.
本研究通过设计提供对抗耐药微生物新方法的混合纳米材料，探索了不同的抗菌作用机制。在这里，我们提出了一种廉价的铜-聚苯胺（Cu-PANI）纳米复合材料，通过简单的原位聚合方法制备，聚合物和金属纳米颗粒同时生成。铜纳米颗粒（CuNPs）均匀分散在聚合物中，具有较窄的尺寸分布（dav = 6nm）。我们发现，CuNPs 和 PANI 对三种菌株大肠杆菌、金黄色葡萄球菌和白色念珠菌具有协同作用，由此形成的纳米复合材料的抗菌活性高于任何单独作用的成分。在使用平板计数法来量化其时间和浓度的抗菌活性之前，使用了不同的技术（紫外-可见光谱、透射电子显微镜、扫描电子显微镜、场发射扫描电子显微镜、X 射线衍射、傅里叶变换红外分光光度计和电感耦合等离子体发射光谱）来鉴定形成的 Cu-PANI 纳米复合材料的光学、结构和化学方面。这种纳米复合材料的抗菌活性表明，微生物的生长已被完全抑制；此外，一些测试的微生物被杀死。原子力显微镜揭示了由于与 Cu-PANI 纳米复合材料孵育后细胞壁完整性的破坏，测试细胞的形态发生了剧烈变化。
