Advanced Nanocomposite Hydrogels for Photocatalysis and Antibacterial Activity Applications: Synthesis, Characterization, and Performance Evaluation

Nanocomposite hydrogels (NCHs) are a combination of two components nanofiller and hydrogel, this combination results in an advanced class of material known for its unique properties, making it suitable for various applications. Among them, are catalysis and biomedical. Herein, the preparation of nanocomposite hydrogels (NCHs) via the in-situ reduction approach was investigated. Potassium polyacrylate hydrogel (PPAH) was utilized to load silver (Ag) and Zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles. The as-prepared samples PPAH/Agx and PPAH/Ag@ZnO NCHs were thoroughly characterized by different analytical techniques including UV-Vis, FTIR, XRD, SEM, and EDX. The indirect band gap energies were estimated to be 2.5 and 1.75 eV for PPAH/Ag and PPAH/Ag@ZnO, respectively, SEM images showed cubic shape for Ag NPs, The EDX quantitative analysis revealed that PPAH/Ag contains 60.48% of silver while PPAH/Ag@ZnO contains 58.77, 28.05, and 13.18% of Silver, Zinc, and Oxygen elements. during this work, the photocatalytic activity of the as-prepared NCHs was studied under sunlight irradiation, the outcomes presented 95% elimination of Rose Bengal dye over PPAH/Ag. Also, 98.77, and 98.05% elimination of o-Toluidine blue and 4-Bromophenol dyes, respectively, over PPAH/Ag@ZnO. Besides, PPAH/Ag@ZnO was subjected to a reusability test over 5 consecutive cycles in the degradation of o-Toluidine blue and 4-bromophenol dyes, the findings demonstrated its exceptional effectiveness and stability, Finally, PPAH/Agx samples exhibited better antibacterial effect against different types of microorganisms, namely Pseudomonas aeruginosa ATCC 27853, Escherichia coli ATCC 25922, and Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923 compared to most antibiotics used in this test. Overall, based on these results, these materials have promising potential for successful applications in catalysis and biomedical fields.