Plant Secondary Metabolite-Derived Polymers: A Potential Approach to Develop Antimicrobial Films
1
Electronics Materials Lab, College of Science and Engineering, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD 4811, Australia
2
Physics Department, College of Science, Ramadi, Anbar University, Ramadi 11, Iraq
3
School of Chemistry, Physics, Mechanical Engineering, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, QLD 4000, Australia
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Polymers 2018, 10(5), 515; https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10050515
Received: 4 April 2018
/
Revised: 27 April 2018
/
Accepted: 2 May 2018
/
Published: 10 May 2018
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Polymers from Renewable Resources)
The persistent issue of bacterial and fungal colonization of artificial implantable materials and the decreasing efficacy of conventional systemic antibiotics used to treat implant-associated infections has led to the development of a wide range of antifouling and antibacterial strategies. This article reviews one such strategy where inherently biologically active renewable resources, i.e., plant secondary metabolites (PSMs) and their naturally occurring combinations (i.e., essential oils) are used for surface functionalization and synthesis of polymer thin films. With a distinct mode of antibacterial activity, broad spectrum of action, and diversity of available chemistries, plant secondary metabolites present an attractive alternative to conventional antibiotics. However, their conversion from liquid to solid phase without a significant loss of activity is not trivial. Using selected examples, this article shows how plasma techniques provide a sufficiently flexible and chemically reactive environment to enable the synthesis of biologically-active polymer coatings from volatile renewable resources.
View Full-Text
Keywords:
volatile renewable resources; microbial infection; plant secondary metabolites; antimicrobial essential oils; biologically-active polymers; plasma-assisted technique
▼
Show Figures
Graphical abstract
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited
MDPI and ACS Style
Al-Jumaili, A.; Kumar, A.; Bazaka, K.; Jacob, M.V. Plant Secondary Metabolite-Derived Polymers: A Potential Approach to Develop Antimicrobial Films. Polymers 2018, 10, 515. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10050515
AMA Style
Al-Jumaili A, Kumar A, Bazaka K, Jacob MV. Plant Secondary Metabolite-Derived Polymers: A Potential Approach to Develop Antimicrobial Films. Polymers. 2018; 10(5):515. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10050515
Chicago/Turabian StyleAl-Jumaili, Ahmed, Avishek Kumar, Kateryna Bazaka, and Mohan V. Jacob. 2018. "Plant Secondary Metabolite-Derived Polymers: A Potential Approach to Develop Antimicrobial Films" Polymers 10, no. 5: 515. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10050515
Find Other Styles
Note that from the first issue of 2016, MDPI journals use article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.
