Unexpected Enhancement in Antibacterial Activity of N-Halamine Polymers from Spheres to Fibers

Abstract

Preventing bacterial infections is a main focus of medical care. Antibacterial agents with broad and excellent disinfection capability against pathogenic bacteria are in fact urgently required. Herein, a novel strategy for the development of N-halamine polymers from spheres to fibers using a combined copolymerization-electrospinning-chlorination technique was reported, allowing fight against bacterial pathogen. Optimizing the process conditions, e.g., comonomer molar ratio, concentration of electrospinning solution, chlorination order, and chlorination period, resulted in the formation of N-halamine fibers with controllable morphology. N-Halamine polymers were tested against two common bacterial pathogens, Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, and were found to be extremely potent against both bacteria, suggesting that they possess powerful sterilizing properties. Remarkably, compared with those with sphere morphology, N-halamine fibers show unexpected enhancement toward both pathogens possibly because of their shape (fiber morphology), surface state (rough surfaces), and surface charge (positive zeta potentials). It is believed that this approach has great potential to be utilized in various fields where antifouling and antibacterial properties are highly required.

Microwave‐assisted rapid fabrication of antibacterial polyacrylonitrile microfibers/nanofibers via nitrile click chemistry and electrospinning

“…The threat to humans from microorganisms continues to be a great and worldwide health challenges; hence, the development of materials with antimicrobial activity has attracted great attention from all walks of research . An ideal antibacterial material should have advantages of high efficiency, wide compatibility, good biocompatibility, long‐term activity, low cost, and easy synthesis.…”

Antibacterial poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-4-hydroxybutyrate) fibrous membranes containing quaternary ammonium salts

“…As presented in Fig. D, P(3HB‐4HB)/QAS18‐SCM displayed a quite smooth surface, which reduced the contact between antimicrobial agents and the targeted microorganisms . Meanwhile, Gram‐negative E. coli O157:H7 have more complex cell walls than Gram‐positive S. aureus , which is much more difficult to penetrate, resulting in poor sensitivity …”

Silver (Ag) doped magnesium phosphate microplatelets as next‐generation antibacterial orthopedic biomaterials

“…In contrast to conventional antibiotics, the biomaterials sector has witnessed the genesis of various kinds of innovative antimicrobial agents (Regiel‐Futyra et al, ). Materials like peptides (Marr, Gooderham, & Hancock, ; Meher, Sahu, Saini, & Rao, ), zinc/zinc oxide (ZnO) (Bhattacharjee et al, ; Cai et al, ; Raghupathi, Koodali, & Manna, ), N‐halamines (Dong et al, ; Kang et al, ), quaternary ammonium salt (Munoz‐Bonilla & Fernández‐García, ; Timofeeva & Kleshcheva, ) and povidone−iodine (PVP − I 2 ) (Gao, Wang, Liu, & Du, ) have been effectively used to treat surgical site infections (SSI) in orthopedics (Gao et al, ). However, compared with antibiotics and other antibacterial agents, silver (Ag) is recognized as a universal and traditional bactericidal agent that has shown a useful bactericidal effect on a broad spectrum of microbial species over decades (Chernousova & Epple, ).…”