Electrospun nanofibers are unique one-dimensional materials with high surface area to volume ratio which can be used in various applications including in antibacterial application. In this study, we demonstrated a simple fabrication of polyethylene oxide-polypyrrole (PEO-PPy) composite nanofibers with antibacterial properties. The polymerization of pyrrole was conducted using ammonium persulfate (APS) initiator at ambient temperature for 24 h. The resulting PEO-PPy nanofibers were then characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), fourier transform infrared (FTIR), and tensile tests. The morphology of nanofibers observed by SEM revealed that the minimum concentration of PEO was 8 wt % to obtain the bead-free nanofibers. Meanwhile, variation of pyrrole concentration does not alter the morphology of nanofibers significantly. The crystallinity of the nanofibers increased with increasing the PEO amount indicated by two typical peaks located at 2θ = 19°and 23°, respectively. On the other hand, polypyrrole contributed the antibacterial properties significantly to the nanofibers and as a result, the antibacterial activity determined by UV-Vis spectrophotometer increased dramatically with increasing pyrrole concentration from 0.1 to 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, and 0.5 mM. The electrospun nanofiber mats exhibited good antibacterial properties on E. coli and biocompatibility properties on L929 fibroblasts cell.
The emerging solar steam generation is considered as a promising technology for seawater desalination and wastewater purification utilizing solar energy. Herein, for the first-time, a recycled rock wool (RW) waste...
Synthesis of carbon dots from soybeans with urea doped (N-CDs) has been successfully conducted using the bottom-up approach via the hydrothermal method. The N-CDs showed a dark brown solution, indicating the carbon dots formed. This study analyzed the effect of optical properties before and after Fe (II) ions addition on the sensitivity of N-CDs. N-CDs characterizations were analyzed using UV-Vis Spectrophotometer and Photoluminescence Spectroscopy (PL). The results showed that the absorbance spectrum range is from 200 to 600 nm, with its absorbance peak at 290 nm. The band gap energy obtained is 3.32 eV, which indicates that N-CDs are semiconductors. The N-CDs solution resulted in good fluorescence when observed under ultraviolet light (395 nm) and emitted a bright green color. N-CDs' sensitivity when sensing Fe (II) ions with a minimum Limit of Detection (LOD) is as low as 5.7 nM. Thus, N-CDs can be used as biosensors with an easy and environmentally friendly method.
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