<i>Balanites aegyptiaca</i> Oil Synthesized Iron Oxide Nanoparticles: Characterization and Antibacterial Activity

Abstract

Antibacterial activity of iron oxide nanoparticles, an employing B. aegyptiaca oil (L.) Del., was used as natural stabilizer by modifying a co-precipitation method. In this work, we chose B. aegyptiaca oil as the new surfactant coating agent, and synthesized B. aegyptiaca oil coating with iron oxide nanoparticles which were characterized with a variety of methods, including Gas Chromatography (GC) to determine the fatty acids composition of the seeds oil, Fourier Transform-Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) equipped with Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS), X-ray Powder Diffractometer (XRD) and Vibrating Sample Magnetometer (VSM). In antibacterial studies, disk diffusion susceptibility test was used to measure efficacy of iron oxide nanoparticles against Gram-positive bacteria Staphylococcus aureus ( S. aureus ), Bacillus subtilis (B. subtilis) and Gram-negative bacteria Escherichia coli ( E. coli ) in terms of zone inhibition. The B. aegyptiaca coated on the surface of iron oxide nanoparticles; its particle size was found to be nanoscale below 50 nm, and the magnetization ( ^δ s) was 16.975 emu g -1 . Antibacterial activity was measured. Efficacy of iron oxide nanoparticles against bacterial strains was found in Escherichia coli ( E. coli ). All these findings suggest that the nanoparticles synthesized from B. aegyptiaca oil may be a promising reagent for a wide variety of applications in biological fields as well as in nanomedicine.