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Abstract
Background and methods
Despite continuous efforts, the increasing prevalence of resistance among pathogenic bacteria to common antibiotics has become one of the most significant concerns in modern medicine. Nanostructured materials are used in many fields, including biological sciences and medicine. While some bismuth derivatives has been used in medicine to treat vomiting, nausea, diarrhea, and stomach pain, the biocidal activity of zerovalent bismuth nanoparticles has not yet been studied. The objective of this investigation was to analyze the antimicrobial activity of bismuth nanoparticles against oral bacteria and their antibiofilm capabilities.
Results
Our results showed that stable colloidal bismuth nanoparticles had 69% antimicrobial activity against Streptococcus mutans growth and achieved complete inhibition of biofilm formation. These results are similar to those obtained with chlorhexidine, the most commonly used oral antiseptic agent. The minimal inhibitory concentration of bismuth nanoparticles that interfered with S. mutans growth was 0.5 mM.
Conclusion
These results suggest that zerovalent bismuth nanoparticles could be an interesting antimicrobial agent to be incorporated into an oral antiseptic preparation.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank P Santiago-Jacinto and L Rendon from the Institute of Physics of National Autonomous University of Mexico (IF-UNAM) for obtaining TEM images. D Velasco-Arias and R Hernandez-Delgadillo wish to thank CONACyT for a scholarship. D Diaz and C Cabral-Romero also wish to thank CONACyT for financing the projects 132094 and 141616. This work was also supported by further grants from PROMEP-SEP (103.5/11/6627) and PAICYT-UANL-2011 to CCR.
Disclosure
The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.