Antimicrobial properties of biosynthesized silver nanoparticles studied by flow cytometry and related techniques

This work reports the effect of silver bionanoparticles (Bio(AgNPs) synthesized by Actinobacteria CGG 11n on selected Gram (+) and Gram (-) bacteria. Flow cytometry, classical antibiogram method and fluorescent microscopy approach was used for evaluation of antimicrobial activity of Bio(AgNPs) and their combination with antibiotics. Furthermore, the performed research specified the capacity of flow cytometry method as an alternative to the standard ones and as a complementary method to electromigration techniques. The study showed antibacterial activity of both BioAgNPs and the combination of antibiotics/BioAgNPs against all the tested bacteria strains in comparison with a diffusion, dilution and bioautographic methods. The synergistic effect of antibiotics/BioAgNPs combination (e.g. kanamycin, ampicillin, neomycin and streptomycin) was found to be more notable against Pseudomonas aeruginosa representing a prototype of multi-drug resistant "superbugs" for which effective therapeutic options are very limited.