Biosynthesization of ZnO/CuO Nanocomposites in Orange Peel Crude Extract for Antibacterial Activities

Tibebu  Alemu; Girmaye  Asefa; Musa  Shumbura; Asefa  Kenani; Andualem Merga  Tullu

doi:10.20372/au.jssd.11.2.2023.0467

Authors

Tibebu Alemu Department of Chemistry, College of Natural and Computational Sciences, Ambo University, Ambo, Ethiopia
Girmaye Asefa Department of Chemistry, College of Natural and Computational Sciences, Ambo University, Ambo, Ethiopia
Musa Shumbura Department of Chemistry, College of Natural and Computational Sciences, Ambo University, Ambo, Ethiopia
Asefa Kenani Department of Biology, College of Natural and Computational Sciences, Ambo University, Ambo, Ethiopia
Andualem Merga Tullu Faculty of Chemistry, Silesian University of Technology, Marcina Strzody 9, 44-100 Gliwice, Poland

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.20372/au.jssd.11.2.2023.0467

Keywords:

Green synthesis routes, bacterial growth inhibition, ZnO/CuO Nanocomposites, , inhibition zones, orange peel extract

Abstract

Nanoparticles (NPs) in particular ZnO and CuO are inorganic nanomaterials used in application areas such as electronics, communication, chemical/biological sensors, cosmetics, environmental remediation, biomedicinal industry, energy preservation, photocatalysis, and microbial growth inhibition. This study focused on the biosynthesis of ZnO NPs, CuO NPs, and ZnO/CuO nanocomposites (NCs) in orange fruit extract to investigate the growth inhibition of gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. The crystal structure, functional group, and energy band gap of as-synthesized NPs and NCs were characterized with the aid of X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR), and Ultra Violet-Visible (UV-Vis) spectroscopic techniques, respectively. Consequently, the XRD results confirmed the formation of a hexagonal wurtzite phase, and the average crystallite sizes of the nanomaterials of 22.71-33.89, 16.46-33.04 and 16.76-26.89 nm for ZnO NPs, CuO NPs, and ZnO/CuO NCs synthesized with and without orange peel extract, respectively while the vibrational stretching obtained around 476 and 564 cm^-1 confirmed the presence of Zn-O, and Cu-O bond, respectively. The characteristic absorption spectrum observed at 285 nm supported the synthesization of ZnO/CuO NCs within a very narrow energy bandgap. Furthermore, the antibacterial activity of the ZnO/CuO with orange peel extract (WE) NCs, ZnO (WE) and CuO (WE) were significantly higher as compared to that without orange fruit extracts (WoE) NPs/NCs. The results show that the NPs and NCs synthesized WE had a high potential growth inhibition zone against gram-positive bacteria (S. aureus) ranges from 16.67 to 12.00 mm and gram-negative bacteria (P. aeroginosa) ranges 16.00 to 12.30 mm. In this study, we have discovered that the green synthesized ZnO/CuO NCs can be introduced as a promising anti-bacterial agent and so applicable to cure microbial strain-based infectious diseases.