Antifungal cellulose by capsaicin surface grafting

MARTINI, RAQUEL; SERRANO, LUIS; BARBOSA, SILVIA; LABIDI, JALEL

CELLULOSE

SPRINGER

Lugar: Berlin; Año: 2014 vol. 21 p. 1909 - 1919

0969-0239

Cellulose is one of the most abundant materials in nature. Besides its biological function, cellulose can be extracted from cell wall and used in several industrial applications. Thus, it can be used in papers, pharmaceuticals, food, cosmetics and in innovative materials such as nanocomposites, packaging, coatings and dispersion technology. With the aim of extending cellulose applications and produce so called ?smart? materials, new functionality can be introduced by physical or chemical modifications. Taking into account that capsaicin, the active component of chili peppers is an excellent antifungal agent, a potential new material could be obtained by chemical reaction between this active compound and cellulose. In this work, capsaicin grafting onto cellulose using polycarboxylic acid as linking agent is proposed. The reaction occurrence was corroborated by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and UV-vis spectrophotometry in reflectance mode. Modified cellulose with less than 2 wt% of capsaicin shows a strong change in antifungal activity respect to unmodified one. This activity was evaluated by fungal growth inhibition test with two different fungi, Trametes versicolor and Gloeophyllum trabeum. Modified cellulose samples showed a high percentage of fungal growth inhibition demonstrating the success of the cellulose modification and the high anti-fungal power of the grafting molecule.