Building nanomaterials with microbial factories: A sustainable approach

ANTEZANA PABLO E.; MUNICOY SOFIA; DESIMONE MARTIN F

Biogenic Sustainable Nanotechnology Trends and Progress

Elsevier

Año: 2022; p. 1 - 39

Microorganisms possess the ability to fabricate nanomaterials of different shapes, sizes, and chemical compositions. The sophisticated synthesis machinery present in microorganisms allows them to employ a great variety of building blocks to construct new biosynthesized nanostructures, which could be accumulated in vesicles inside the cells or transported outside. In this way, possible toxicological effects are avoided. This inherently complex synthesis of nanomaterials has been a source of bioinspiration and biomimetics for years. Specially, bacteria are preferred for nanoparticles (NPs) production due to their fast proliferation rate, their easy cultivation, low energy requirements and minimum costs. This chapter describes the biosynthesis and most important features of metal NPs (gold, silver, magnetite, copper, selenium and quantum dots) obtained by bacterial machineries. Proposed intracellular and extracellular mechanisms for biogenic synthesis of NPs by bacteria are also reviewed Furthermore, summarizes the current applications of the biogenic nanosized materials and discusses the challenges and future perspectives of the microbial synthesis approaches.