Investigation of antimicrobial activity and amoxicillin release properties of polyvinyl alcohol and chitosan nanofibers containing silver nanoparticles

Polymer-based drug delivery systems as they have advantages such as improved therapeutic efficacy, reduced toxicity are quite promising to use in biomedical applications. Amoxicillin is a broad-spectrum β-lactam antibiotic that is used in the treatment of bacterial infections and has a bactericidal action against gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria. Chitosan is a natural polymer with properties such as wound healing properties, antimicrobial and antiinflammatory activity. Poly vinyl alcohol (PVA) is a non-toxic polymer with good chemical and physical properties such as water solubility, chemical resistance, high melting point and biological compatibility. The treatment of wound dressings containing antibiotics can decrease wound infection. Silver nanoparticles are highly effective antimicrobials and are used in wound dressings. In the first step of this thesis, amoxicillin-containing nanofibers were prepared and the optimum cross-linking time and drug amount were determined. In the second step, the optimum amount of silver for the electrophoresis method was determined and silver loaded amoxicillin nanofibers were prepared. Finally, the drug releasing and antimicrobial activity studies have been carried out. The amount of drug released from nanofibers was determined using the HPLC method. Characterization of nanofibers was performed by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Infrared Spectroscopy (IR), Energy Diffraction X-ray Analysis (SEM / EDX) and X-ray Diffraction (XRD).