Ionic liquid-assisted fabrication of poly(vinyl alcohol)/nanosilver/graphene oxide composites and their cytotoxicity/antimicrobial activity

Antimicrobial materials with enhanced mechanical and thermal properties must be developed for innovative applications in medicine, food and packaging, etc. This study presents ionic liquid-assisted fabrication of graphene oxide, silver nanoparticles and poly(vinyl alcohol) based composite films (PVA/Ag/GO-IL) for antibacterial applications. The morphological, structural, thermal and mechanical characteristics of the nanocomposite films were investigated and compared with PVA/Ag/GO nanocomposite films fabricated without using ionic liquid. The presence of ionic liquid enhanced the dispersion of nanofillers in PVA matrix and improved the mechanical and thermal properties. Further, investigations were carried to assess the antibacterial and cytotoxic properties of the samples. The antibacterial tests of nanocomposite films were performed on Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus using two different methods. The results showed superior antibacterial activity of PVA/Ag/GO-IL nanocomposite films as compared to PVA/Ag/GO and PVA/Ag films. The PVA/Ag/GO-IL and PVA/Ag/GO nanocomposites exhibited low cytotoxicity on MCF-7, MDA-MB-231(cancer cell lines) and MCF-10A (human epithelial cell line) indicating good biocompatibility.