Evaluation of antibacterial property induced by surface-modified titanium dioxide nanoparticles

In this paper, we evaluate excellent antibacterial effect induced by poly(quaternary ammonium) functionalized titanium dioxide nanoparticles without external excitations. The idea originates from the excellent antimicrobial property of quaternary ammonium salts. The effects of poly(quaternary ammonium) and polyacrylate sodium functional groups as nanoparticle surfactants are compared to show that poly(quaternary ammonium) functional groups are responsible for the induced antibacterial effect. 99.999% of E. coli can be destructed in 10 minutes by simply mixing bacteria with nanoparticle dispersions. Nanoparticle concentration has an impact on the antibacterial property and is evaluated. The engineered nanoparticles can find enormous applications such as self-cleaning surfaces, waste water treatment, Lab-on-a-Chip devices and many more.