Unveiling Antimicrobial Activity of Metal Iodide (CuI, AgI, and PbI2) Nanoparticles: Towards Biomedical Surfaces Applications

Synthesizing nanoparticles (NPs) capable of hindrance the microbial colonization is a global demand. Such NPs can prevent emerging infectious diseases that harm the public health. In this paper, a co-precipitation method is employed to synthesize colloidal of metal iodide, namely copper iodide (CuI), silver iodide (AgI), and lead iodide (PbI2). Subsequently, EDS, XRD, HRSEM with mapping technique are conducted to study the structural properties of the as-synthesized samples. Additionally, their absorption is highlighted using UV/Vis spectroscopy. NPs with average crystallite size equals to 54.98, 57.02, and 23.47 nm for PbI2, CuI, and AgI, respectively are calculated. SEM images show that PbI2 consists of randomly-oriented dense nanoflakes of iodide. CuI NPs have a dense medium with tiny particles adhered to larger particles related to copper. Further, AgI sample contains agglomerated crystallites with a combination of small and large sizes. Antimicrobial activity of the samples against all tested standard pathogens is examined. In particular, AgI NPs have a prominent antimicrobial capability against Escherichia coli, Candida albicans and Staphylococcus aureus (ZOI of 18.0, 16.0 and 15.0 mm, respectively). Therefore, the AgI NPs can be safely used in solving serious industrial, pharmaceutical and medical challenges and particularly in the treatment of surface infectious diseases.