Selective laser welding in liquid: A strategy for preparation of high-antibacterial activity nanozyme against Staphylococcus aureus

Highlights

• A facile approach of selective laser welding in liquid was proposed to prepare high-antibacterial activity nanozyme.

• Taking Ag/CeO₂ nanocomposite as an example, this nanozyme can be effectively prepared under the proper laser fluence.  82.4 % sterilization rate can be obtained, which was 2.93 and 2.99 times than those of pure Ag and pure CeO₂, respectively.

• This work provided a facile strategy for preparation of high-antibacterial activity nanozyme against Staphylococcus aureus.

Abstract

Nanozyme was considered as one of the most promising substitutes for antibiotics, due to the selective catalysis for pathogens. In this work, a high-antibacterial activity SOD-like nanozyme based on hybrid Ag/CeO₂ nanocomposite was facilely prepared by using an innovative approach of selective laser welding in liquid. This prepared nanozyme displayed a high antimicrobial effect against Staphylococcus aureus under visible light illumination, the sterilization rate as high as 82.4%, which was 2.93 and 2.99 times higher than those of pure Ag and pure CeO₂, respectively. The enhanced antibacterial activity was attributed to the anchoring of Ag nanospheres on the surface of CeO₂ nanosheets, which induced the reduction of CeO₂ bandgap and boosted the visible light harvesting. Therefore, the charge carriers can be effectively stimulated to produce abundant reactive oxygen species on the Ag/CeO₂ nanocomposite via a SOD-like route. This work demonstrated a facile strategy for the preparation of high-antibacterial activity nanozyme, giving it great potential for scalable application in the biomedical and pharmaceutical industry.