CHARACTERIZATION AND PATHOGENIC POTENTIALS OF ZNO NANOPARTICLES FROM ORGANIC EXTRACT OF BARRINGTONIA ASIATICA STEM BARK

Barringtonia asiatica (L.) Kurtz belong to a Family of Lecythidaceae, is a species native to mangrove habitats in the tropical with a pinkish grey stem bark. It has been commonly used in traditional medicine for a range of ailments and is consumed as raw vegetable in Malaysia. The aim of the study was to synthesis and to evaluate the antibacterial activity of ZnO nanoparticles (NPs) from organic extracts of Barringtonia asiatica stem-bark using zinc chloride (ZnCl2) and zinc acetate dehydrate [Zn (CH3COO)2∙2H2O] as precursors on selected Gram positive and Gram negative bacterial: Escherichia coli (Gram–ve), Staphylococcus aureus, (Gram +ve), Pseudomonas aeruinosa (Gram –ve), Bcillus anthracis (Gram+ve) and Klebsielia Pneumonia (Gram +ve). Obtained was a Spherical and flake-like nanostructures recorded by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) for B.asiatica for the two precursors used. The average particle size and crystallite size determined by Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and X-ray Diffraction (XRD) for B: asiatica were in the range of 31.868.0.26 nm and 31.6-67.7 nm respectively. To observe the purity and surface functional groups of the samples, Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), UVvisible spectroscopy (UV-vis), Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) techniques were used and the Spectra peaks at 440-458 cm-1 and 364-370 nm confirmed the presence of ZnO in the samples by FT-IR and UV-vis, whereas AAS at 214.8 nm wavelength further confirmed elemental zinc with a percentage atomic weight of 72.16% as against 65.78%, 16.38%, 11.86% and 70.49%, 15.32%, 12.26% for Zinc, Oxygen and Carbon by EDX. The result from the antibacterial activity studies show an increase in inhibition rate as concentration of the ZnO NPs increases in concentration from 25-1000 μg/ml. ZnO NPs from B. asiatica stem-bark extracts recorded the highest inhibition rate in Staphylococcus aureus recorded the highest inhibition of 3.99 ± 0.17 mm at 1000 μg/ml of Barringtonia asiatica stem-bark of ZnO precursor.