Synthesis of phytonic silver nanoparticles as bacterial and ATP energy silencer

Recently, silver nanoparticles have been widely applied in various fields as inorganic antimicrobial agents. This present study adopted a facile, environmentally friendly and cost-effective method to green synthesized silver nanoparticles via the extract of Dioscorea cirrhosa tuber (DCTE-Ag NPs). Green synthesized Ag nanoparticles were characterized by using the transmission electron microscope, X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD), UV-visible spectroscopy (UV-Vis), fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), etc. The results authenticate that the green synthesized Ag NPs were spherical in shape with an average size of 13.87 ± 2.38 nm and have crystalline properties. According to the antibacterial test, the average width of the inhibition zone of green synthesized Ag NPs against Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) and Escherichia coli (E. coli) were 14.17 ± 0.84 mm and 13.01 ± 0.72 mm, respectively. The antibacterial property of Ag NPs was further evaluated by determining the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC), and the results indicated that they exhibited outstanding antimicrobial activity. Besides, DCTE-Ag NPs has the good bacteriostasis function, which can damage bacterial cells membrane to leak the intracellular contents and inhibit the activity of Na⁺/K⁺-ATP-ase to hinder energy conversion.