Biogenic Synthesis for Silver and Copper Nanoparticles Supported by Lemon Peel Derived Microfibers of Cellulose and their High Performance Catalytic and Antibacterial Applications

Abstract

This article reports the first biogenic synthesis of silver and copper nanoparticles supported by thread-like lemon-peel-derived microfibers of cellulose (LMFC) with a width ranged from 13.4 to 17.8 μm. Biomass-derived LMFC is prepared via smashing lemon peel using a food blender and employed as simultaneous reducing and stabilizing agents for the preparation of heterogeneous Ag@LMFC, Cu@LMFC, and AgCu@LMFC. Fourier-transform infrared (FT-IR) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) manifests that the polyol groups in LMFC acted as the reducing agent. The nanoparticles anchored on Ag@LMFC and AgCu@LMFC disperse well and the sizes are 14.1 ± 3.0 and 14.4 ± 3.2 nm, respectively, which are much smaller than the ones (27.8 ± 5.3 nm) in Cu@LMFC due to their different reducing potentials. The obtained AgCu@LMFC (0.5 mmol%, TOF = 9761 h⁻¹) is the most efficient reusable silver/copper nanoparticle reported for 4-nitrophenol reduction so far, with catalytic efficiency even reaching that of precious metals. Moreover, Ag@LMFC exhibits much higher antibacterial activity than Cu@LMFC against both Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria. This biogenic synthesis brings a sustainable alternative to conventional chemical methods for fabrication heterogeneous silver and copper nanoparticles with high performance catalytic and antibacterial applications.