Controllable synthesis and antioxidant activity of gold nanoparticles using chlorogenic acid

Abstract

In this work, we report a controllable green synthesis of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) using chlorogenic acid (CGA) as the only reducing and stabilizing agent. The well-dispersed AuNPs are obtained due to the protection of CGA against aggregation. The resulting AuNPs are controllable in size and shape mainly by changing the molar ratio of HAuCl₄ to CGA in reductive process. With an increase in CGA concentration, the average size of AuNPs increased, which resulted in different morphologies from spherical to flower-like shapes. The dropping speed of gold precursor is also found to influence the size of AuNPs in different trends. Additionally, the advantages of CGA for synergistic biological activities are demonstrated through the enhanced antioxidant activity of AuNPs with CGA for scavenging of DPPH radicals. The controllable size and shape of nanoparticles are potentially important in nanomedical application.

Keywords:

• Controllable synthesis
• chlorogenic acid
• gold nanoparticles
• antioxidant activity

Declaration of interests

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Hainan Provincial Key Research and Development Project (No. ZDYF2018024) and the Science Research Project of Hainan higher Education Institutions (No. Hnky2017-30).