Eight fungi, Rhizopus.spp, Aspergillus terreus, A.flavus, A.niger, A.clavatus, Acremonium.spp, A.rutilum, Trichoderma.sp. have been screened for the production of silver nanoparticle. The fungal filtrates of the above said isolates were subjected to silver nitrate. After incubation, visual observation of brown color is an indication of silver nanoparticle production. Of the eight fungi, only one Rhizopus stolonifer showed maximum absorbance at 422nm. Parametric optimization study showed maximum absorbance at 400 C and pH 7.0. Further characterization was made by UV-Visible absorption spectroscopy which shows maximum absorption at 422 nm, Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) revealed the formation of spherical nanoparticles with size ranging between 5 to 50 nm. Energy Dispersive Spectroscope (EDS) shows the optical absorption peak at 3kev, Fourier Transform Infrared (FT-IR) shows the bands at 1645(1), 1537(2) and 1454(3) cm-1.
UV-Visible absorption spectroscopy is one of the most widely used techniques for structural characterization of silver nanoparticles. In our experiment the maximum absorbance was observed at 422nm, implying that the bioreduction of the silver nitrate has taken place following incubation of the AgNO3 solution in the presence of cell-free extract. Our results are correlating with the reports of Sadowski, et al, (2008) and Maliszwaska, et.al., (2009) with the fungus Penicillium. Surface plasmon peak was located at 420 nm using klebsiella pneumonia (Minaeian et al 2008). Mukherjee et al, (2007) reported an intense peak at 410nm. It is reported that the absorption spectrum of spherical silver nanoparticles presents a maximum between 420nm and 450nm (Maliszewska 2008).
A representative TEM image recorded from drop coated film of a silver nanoparticles are spherical in shape. All the particles are well separated and no agglomeration was noticed. The size ranges between 5nm to30 nm was seen.
The process of growing silver nanoparticles comprises of two key steps:
(a) bioreduction of AgNO3 to produced
silver nanoparticles and
(b) stabilization and/or encapsulation of the same by
suitable capping agents 11. It is suggest that the biological molecules could possibly perform the function for the stabilization of the AgNPs. EDS analysis gives the additional evidence for the reduction of silver nanoparticles to elemental silver. The optical absorption peak is observed approximately at 3kev, which is typical for the absorption of metallic silver nanocrystals due to surface plasmon resonsnce, which confirms the presence of nanocrystalline elemental silver. Spectrum shows strong silver signal along with weak oxygen and carbon peak, which may be originate from the biomolecules that are bound to the surface of nanosilver particles.