Nanoparticles of banana peels as a potential source of bioactive compounds and their activities on HepG2.

Nanoparticles of blanched green banana peels (BGBP) were prepared using physical technique (by grinding) in order to avoid any harm effect on human health that could occurred when metals were used for preparing nanoparticles size (NPs) of banana peels. This work was designed to study the preparation of nano scale (70-135 nm for TEM) (243.4-933.9 nm for SEM) and normal size (0.12-0.25 µm for TEM) (1.150 µm for SEM) from BGBP after milling and evaluate the activities of their extracts as antioxidant, antimicrobial and anticancer agents. The size and shape of nanoparticles were analyzed using Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) and it cleared the appearance of particle aggregation was attributed to mechanical pressure and friction resulting from the interaction between the abrasive balls and the pulverizing vessel's inner surface. Also, Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) shows presence of different spherical shapes ranging between 70 and 135 nm, along with the emergence of slender fibrillary shapes., on the other hand, Fourier transform IR (FT-IR) cleared that the higher extraction yields of phenolic compounds and greater antioxidant activities were achieved due to the increased surface area of nano-scale samples following milling. In addition, X-ray diffraction (XRD) determined the materials crystalline structure. Bioactive compounds (mainly phenolic compounds) were recovered by extracting banana peels weather from normal size or (NPs). The extracted bioactive compounds were subjected to evolution as antioxidant, antimicrobial and anticancer agents. Dealing with this study, it was concluded that bioactive compounds extracted from NPS of BGBP showed antioxidant, antimicrobial and anticancer activities higher than those extracted from the normal size ones. So, it is strongly recommended to use NPs of BGBP for producing these bioactive compounds since these compounds are important to protect humans against a lot of dangerous diseases. Finally, the potential applications of these compounds in the pharmaceutical or food industries would be beneficial.