Antimicrobial Effect of Electrospun Nanofibers Loaded with Silver Nanoparticles: Influence of Ag Incorporation Method

Abstract

The antimicrobial bioactivity of silver nanoparticles is well known, and they can be used widely in many applications, becoming especially important in the biomedical industry. On the other hand, the electrospun nanofibers possess properties that can enhance silver nanoparticle applicability. However, silver nanoparticle bioactivity differs depending on the loading of silver ions into electrospun nanofibers. This review is aimed at comparing different silver incorporation methods into electrospun nanofibers and their antimicrobial activity, discussing each procedure’s limitations, and presenting the most promising one. This review showed that the preferred techniques for incorporating silver nanoparticles were direct blending and ultraviolet irradiation methods due to their simplicity and efficient results. Besides, polyacrylonitrile nanofibers (PAN) have been the most reported system loaded with silver nanoparticles. Finally, independently of the technique used, silver nanoparticle-loaded nanofibers show high antimicrobial activity in all cases.

Novel Drug Carries: Properties and Applications

“…Electrospinning is a versatile technique that has expanded through time, where the objective of this technique is to fabricate fibers or particles in the nanoscale range [32] creating a tridimensional scaffold that has wanted characteristics with potential use as drug carriers such as the large surface area, where this property permits a high drug loading capacity in a reduced volume range [33], low cost [10], and adaptability [33]. The electrospinning technique uses a high-voltage electrical field that charges a polymer solution breaking its surface tension when is injected with a specific rate, this polymeric solution is attracted to a conductive collector creating a liquid jet yielding nanofibers (~10-1000 nm) where the solvent evaporates in the air [18,34].…”

“…The disadvantage of this method is that some metallic bioactive molecules tend to aggregate in the polymer solution and in the resulting fibers [34]. Moreover, with this process, pharmaceutical drugs that are insoluble in water cannot be encapsulated using hydrophilic polymers [41].…”

Electrospun Composite Nanofibers for Functional Applications

“…Additionally, AgNPs disrupt the DNA structure, resulting in non-replication and effectively suppressing bacterial multiplication. These two fundamental factors lead AgNPs to possess potent bactericidal potential [142]. Li et al manufactured PCL nanofibers loaded with AgNPs and cisplatin (DDP), which can be used to prevent airway inflammation and resist granulation tissue proliferation.…”

Preparation and characterization of bioactive polyvinylpyrrolidone film via electrospinning technique

“…Recently, there are great interesting to incorporate metal and nonmetal nanoparticles such as silver, copper, carbon, nickel oxide, iron oxide, titanium dioxide, and zinc oxide with the electrospun polymeric nano/micro fibers in order to increase the efficiency and enhance new functions (Pant et al, 2019; Rosid et al, 2022). Electrospun fibers considered an ideal carrier to the nanoparticles in order to avoid mass aggregation and permit homogeneous distribution (Villarreal‐Gómez et al, 2021). Among the most studied nanomaterial, silver and zinc oxide nanoparticles have a great attention especially in medical field, due to their unique properties and good biocompatibility which are important for photocatalytic and biological applications.…”