Title : Nanoparticle cellulose aerogel for dye degradation and antibacterial applications
Abstract:
Compared with the materials like membranes, inorganic particles and textiles, the aerogel used for supporting metal nanoparticles owns outstanding benefits like large surface area for loading nanoparticles, lightweight, and robust mechanical strength against deformation. Despite the benefits mentioned above, the aerogel as support is required to have sufficient hydrophilicity for contacting targeted aqueous solution if applied to wastewater treatment. Based on these reasons, the cellulosic material is the ideal candidate for constructing the supporting material due to the good hydrophilicity of cellulose itself and its wide availability in nature. Besides, the environmentally benign cellulosic material could guarantee no generation of secondary hazards when treating contaminants in the water system. In the talk, two kinds of nanoparticle cellulose aerogel will be discussed. A metal-organic framework (MOF) composite material, named as copper-benzenedicarboxylate/cellulose aerogel (CuBDC/CA), was designed and synthesized by one-pot precursor preparation of cellulose aerogels anchored with copper, followed by in-situ growth of CuBDC in the presence of terephthalic acid. The aerogel composite showed great potential in wastewater treatment, including dye degradation and antibacterial assays. More than 90% methylene blue could be decomposed by CuBDC/CA in 240 min via the Fenton-like reaction, and the recycling test revealed its good reusability. Moreover, this composite exhibited great antibacterial performance (more than 99.99%) towards commonly used lab strains as well as multidrug-resistant pathogens, including Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The screening tests indicated that the mechanism of killing effect was associated with the damage of bacterial envelope integrity. Another examples is Ag/lignin nanoparticles physically crosslinked in the cellulose hydrogels, followed by freeze-drying to obtain the final Ag/lignin nanoparticle-loaded cellulose aerogel. The Ag/lignin NP-loaded aerogel also showed robust killing efficiency against different pathogenic bacteria in aqueous solution (Escherichia coli: >99.99%, Pseudomonas aeruginosa: >99.9%, Vibrio cholera: >99.99%, Staphylococcus aureus: >99.99%, Bacillus subtilis: >97.4%). Moreover, the loaded Ag/lignin NPs provided the aerogel with excellent catalytic degradation ability toward various organic compounds, including dyes, pollutants, and antibiotics.
Audience Take Away:
- Synthesis of nanoparticle cellulose aerogel.
- Learn the performance of the materials.
- Guide the development of similar materials.
