Title:Mechanisms of Metallic Nanomaterials to Induce an Antibacterial Effect
Volume: 22
Issue: 30
Author(s): Noé Rodríguez-Barajas, Ubaldo de Jesús Martín-Camacho and Alejandro Pérez-Larios*
Affiliation:
- Laboratorio de Investigación en Materiales, Agua y Energía, Departamento de Ingeniería, Centro Universitario de los Altos, Universidad de Guadalajara, Tepatitlán de Morelos, 47600, México
Keywords:
Mechanism action, Nanomaterials, Bacteria, Antibacterial effect, Nanoparticles, Metabolic damage.
Abstract: Pathogenic microorganisms, including bacteria, are becoming resistant to most existing
drugs, which increases the failure of pharmacologic treatment. Therefore, new nanomaterials were
studied to spearhead improvement against the same resistant pathogenic bacteria. This has increased
the mortality in the world population, principally in under-developed countries. Moreover, recently
there has been research to find new drug formulations to kill the most dangerous microorganisms,
such as bacteria cells which should avoid the spread of disease. Therefore, lately, investigations
have been focusing on nanomaterials because they can exhibit the capacity to show an antibacterial
effect. These studies have been trying oriented in their ability to produce an improvement to get antibacterial
damage against the same pathogenic bacteria resistance. However, there are many problems
with the use of nanoparticles. One of them is understanding how they act against bacteria,
"their mechanism(s) action" to induce reduction or even kill the bacterial strains. Therefore, it is essential
to understand the specific mechanism(s) of each nanomaterial used to observe the interaction
between bacteria cells and nanoparticles. In addition, since nanoparticles can be functionalized with
different antibacterial drugs, it is necessary to consider and distinguish the antibacterial activity of
the nanoparticles from the antibacterial activity of the drugs to avoid confusion about how the nanoparticles
work. Knowledge of these differences can help better understand the applications of the
primary nanoparticles (i.e., Ag, Au, CuO, ZnO, and TiO2, among others) described in detail in this
review which are toxic against various bacterial strains.
