Recent Advances in the Disinfection of Water Using Nanoscale Antimicrobial Materials

Abstract

The microbial contamination of water is highlighted as a global problem that threatens human life. Specifically, the lack of clean and safe water has resulted in a high number of deaths annually and thus poses a great challenge to humans. The traditional water purification methods typically consume high amounts of energy, exhibit low disinfection efficiency, and result in the production of toxic by‐products. Therefore, the development of methods for efficient water disinfection is of great significance. Nanomaterials have shown promising prospects in water disinfection due to their unique properties. Recent progress in the use of nanomaterials for water disinfection is summarized herein. The recently developed methods for the synthesis of antibacterial nanomaterials, including metallic nanoparticles, nanosized carbide and nitrides, are depicted, and the structures, morphologies, instincts, and performances of the nanomaterials in bactericidal tests are discussed. In addition, the antibacterial mechanisms and the dominant elements influencing the antimicrobial activities of the nanomaterials are reviewed in detail. Although recent years have shown remarkable progress in water disinfection using nanomaterials, the development of disinfection agents with improved nanoeffects and performance, low toxicity, increased cost efficiency, and easier operation remains urgent.

Molybdenum‐based heterogeneous catalysts for the control of environmental pollutants

“…Nevertheless, traditional MoS 2 still has the problems of small surface area, narrow bandgap, insufficient sterilization efficiency, high biological toxicity, and bacterial resistance 97 . Therefore, multiple efforts have been developed to overcome these defects of MoS 2 , thereby improving its application in medical sterilization.…”

Facile synthesis, characterization of nano-tungsten trioxide decorated with silver nanoparticles and their antibacterial activity against water-borne gram-negative pathogens

“…have garnered significant attention due to their extraordinary physical, chemical and biotic properties in different fields, including Nano-biotechnology, biomedical and medicine (Khan et al 2016;Baig and Gondal 2016;Gondal et al 2012). Moreover, these semiconducting metal-oxide nanoparticles have been extensively investigated for antimicrobial studies on gram-positive (Staphylococcus aureus) and gram-negative (Escherichia coli) human pathogens because of their favourable properties of small size, high surface area, low cost, low toxicity and extraordinary reactivity (Miao et al 2019;Khalil et al 2011;Gondal et al 2011). Tungsten trioxide (WO 3 ) nanoparticles are a sort of semiconducting metal-oxide that has temperature dependent tetragonal, orthorhombic, monoclinic and triclinic crystal structures.…”

“…Metal nanoparticles, for example, copper (Cu), nickel (Ni), gold (Au), platinum (Pt), palladium (Pd), silver (Ag), etc. have been generally researched as antimicrobial agents (Miao et al 2019). Furthermore, these metal nanoparticles have been effectively used as decorating materials (with doping or loading for metal nanoparticles) to improve the antibacterial activity of semiconducting metal-oxide nanoparticles, graphitic carbon nitride, carbon nanotubes, graphene oxide sheets and metal free silicon carbide (Bagabas et al 2010;Baig et al 2018a, b).…”

“…Furthermore, these metal nanoparticles have been effectively used as decorating materials (with doping or loading for metal nanoparticles) to improve the antibacterial activity of semiconducting metal-oxide nanoparticles, graphitic carbon nitride, carbon nanotubes, graphene oxide sheets and metal free silicon carbide (Bagabas et al 2010;Baig et al 2018a, b). Amongst metal nanoparticles, Ag nanoparticles have been explored widely due to its low cost, low toxicity and superb antibacterial activity against gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria (Miao et al 2019). Therefore, the use of noble metal (such as silver) as a decorating or loading material for the enhancement of antibacterial function of WO 3 metal-oxide semiconducting nanoparticles would be significantly encouraging.…”

Recent Advances in g‐C3N4‐Based Photocatalysts for Pollutant Degradation and Bacterial Disinfection: Design Strategies, Mechanisms, and Applications

“…[2][3][4][5][6] In developing countries, it is estimated that about 80% of diseases are caused by water-borne pathogens. The abuse of antibiotics has led to their accumulation in the environment, which have given rise to antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and ultimately led to incurable infections that have increased death rates around the world; [7,8] therefore, the effective treatment of organic dye, pathogen, and antibiotic pollutants is a major environmental remediation task.At present, photocatalysis technology can convert solar energy into electric energy, chemical energy, etc., so that solar energy can be directly applied to environmental catalysis, energy catalysis, organic catalysis, sensing, biological imaging, electrochemical energy storage, and other fields. [9] It is considered one of the sustainability strategies to address future environmental crises.…”