Bacterial toxicity/compatibility of platinum nanospheres, nanocuboids and nanoflowers

For the first time, we have investigated the bacterial toxicity or compatibility properties of Pt nanoparticles (NPs) with different sizes (P1, P2, P3, P4 and P5). The bacterio-toxic or compatible properties of these five different sized Pt NPs with the clinical pathogen, Pseudomonas aeruginosa were explored by many analytical methods such as the conventional plate count method, matrix assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (MALDI-MS), fluorescence microscopy and fluorescence sensoring techniques. The results revealed that the 1–3 nm sized (P1 and P2) Pt NPs showed bacterio-toxic properties while the 4–21 nm (P3, P4 and P5) Pt NPs exhibited bacterio-compatible properties. This is the first study which reports the bacterial toxicity of Pt NPs. The information released from this study is significantly important to future clinical, medical, biological and biomedical applications of Pt NPs.