Synthesis and characterization of hybrid copper-chitosan nanoantimicrobials by femtosecond laser-ablation in liquids

In this work, the unique capability of femtosecond laser pulses to finely fragment via laser ablation a Cu solid target immersed into CS-HAc solutions was exploited in order to obtain a homogeneously dispersed colloid of Cu-CS nanocomposites with different Cu/CS molar ratios according to the initial chitosan concentration. Using these hybrid nanocolloids as solvents, well-dispersed nanocomposite polymer films were produced after spin-coating on glass substrates. Both Cu-CS colloids and coatings were characterized by several techniques, including UV-Vis, FTIR, DLS, TEM and XPS aiming to analyse the surface and bulk chemical composition as well as the morphology of the novel nanocomposite. The antimicrobial properties of the proposed hybrid Cu-CS nanomaterial, which in the intention combines the bioactivity of both components, have been assessed by biological experiments using selected microorganism strains including samples from hospitalized dermatology patients.