One-pot green solid-state synthesis of Cu₂O/microcrystalline cellulose composite with high anti-pathogenic activity

Cuprous oxide (Cu₂O) is proven as an excellent anti-harmful microbial material. However, the liquid and vapor pha5se preparation methods reported so far hardly make pure Cu₂O-containing composites and suffer environmental issues caused by chemical reducing agents with multiple processing steps. This work develops a facile one-pot solid-state sintering method to synthesize Cu₂O/microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) composite via the thermal decomposition and oxidation-reduction reactions where copper formate was reduced by MCC. The Cu₂O/MCC composite exhibits superior purity, dispersibility, stability, high yield, and high efficacy of antibacterial and antiviral properties, e.g., against E. coli, S. aureus, and Equine Arteritis Viral. This work utilizes elegantly the strong reducing capability of cellulose to develop an environmentally benign method to prepare high-purity Cu₂O-polymer composites with low cytotoxicity and cost, which can be incorporated readily into other substrate materials to form various forms of anti-harmful microbial materials widely used in public health care products. In addition, the preparation of Cu₂O-containing composites based on the reducing capability of cellulose is also expected to be applied to other cellulose-based materials for the loading of Cu₂O particles.