Synthesis of environmentally benign antimicrobial dressing nanofibers based on polycaprolactone blended with gold nanoparticles and spearmint oil nanoemulsion

Electrospun nanofibers incorporated with functional additives can be used to produce antimicrobial wound dressings. Thus, the current research work was aimed to obtain highly efficient antimicrobial wound dressing based on the high mechanical and biocompatible polymer; polycaprolactone (PCL) blended with gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) and spearmint oil nanoemulsion (SNE). The nanofibrous wound dressing was obtained through the electrospinning method for PCL solution blended with different concentrations of AuNPs, SNE and both of them. With the assistance of advanced techniques, the as synthesized nanofibers were systematically characterized in terms of their morphological structure, contact angle and mechanical properties. The resultant depicted the preparation of nanofibers with smooth surface when PCL was blended with AuNPs. Meanwhile, the surface of the developed nanofibers was changed to rough surface with the addition of SNE. In addition, the size of the fiber diameter of PCL loaded with SNE was greater than that of pure PCL nanofiber or that loaded with AuNPs. Their antimicrobial activities of the prepared PCL nanofibers blended with AuNPs, SNE and both of them was tested against four different species; Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Staphylococcus aureus and Candida albicans illustrated that the nanofibers have the ability to prevent the growth of microbes. (c) 2021 Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Automated summary

In this study, highly efficient antimicrobial wound dressings were obtained by blending PCL with AuNPs and SNE using the electrospinning method. Characterization of the nanofibers revealed that blending PCL with AuNPs resulted in smooth surface fibers, while the addition of SNE led to a rough surface, indicating good antimicrobial properties in the developed nanofibers.