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Microbial cellulose membranes have attracted a great deal of attention as novel wound-dressing materials, especially for the healing of skin burns and chronic wounds, because of their high water holding capacity and biocompatibility. However, the high humidity around the wound sometimes allows the growth of bacteria, as well as the regeneration of the tissue. In this study, silver nanoparticles were incorporated into the cellulose membranes via a chemical reduction method using a silver salt, silver nitrate (AgNO(3)) and a reducing agent, sodium borohydride (NaBH(4)). The silver nanoparticles were evenly adsorbed on the overall surface of the cellulose nanofibrils without any local aggregation and had a spherical shape with uniform size (8+/-2 nm) which allowed them to show antimicrobial properties. The interaction between the oxygen in cellulose and silver nanoparticles resulted in the stable adsorption of the silver nanoparticles on cellulose nanofibrils. The cellulose membrane with silver nanoparticles exhibited an antimicrobial activity of more than 99.99% against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, so that it could be used as an antimicrobial wound-dressing material for chronic wounds and burns.

We describe a novel class of electrically conductive transparent materials based on multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs). Transparent nanocomposites were fabricated by incorporating an aqueous silk fibroin solution into bacterial cellulose membranes. The transparent nanocomposites had a high transmittance in the visible and infrared regions, regardless of the bacterial cellulose fiber content, due to the nanosize effect of the bacterial cellulose nanofibrils. This phenomenon allowed the preparation of a novel electrically conductive transparent paper. The high dispersity of the MWCNTs was realized by utilizing a bacterial cellulose membrane as a template to deposit them uniformly, thereby achieving electrically conductive transparent papers with outstanding optical transparency. The light transmittance and electrical conductivity varied according to the concentration of the MWCNT dispersion. Good optimal transparency and electrical properties were obtained with a light transmittance of 70.3% at 550 nm and electrical conductivity of 2.1 × 10−3 S/cm when the electrically conductive transparent paper was fabricated from a 0.02 wt % aqueous MWCNT dispersion. In addition, the electrically conductive transparent papers showed remarkable flexibility without any loss of their initial properties. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 46: 1235–1242, 2008

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