Evaluating the Environmental and Biomedical Advantages of Green Synthesised Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles Using an Aqueous Extract of Rumex hastatus Roots

Zinc oxide nanoparticles are highly functional in pharmaceutical and biomedical applications, and plant-mediated nanoparticles which show good biological activities. They can be synthesised by different chemical, physical and biological methods, whereas the green method, or biosynthesis, is environment-friendly and less hazardous. In the present study, zinc oxide Nanoparticles were synthesised using an aqueous (Distilled water) extract of Rumex hastatus roots and 0.05 M zinc acetate dihydrate (Zn(CH₃COO)₂·2H₂O). Maintaining pH with a digital pH meter and using 0.1 M sodium hydroxide (NaOH), the nanoparticles synthesised, confirmed by physical characterisation using Ultraviolet-Visible spectroscopy, showed typical absorption peaks in the range of 320nm to 400nm due to their significant excitation binding energy at room temperature., X-Ray Diffraction analysis (XRD), which confirmed that the particles are crystalline and have a hexagonal wurtzite structure, ZnO-Bonding shown by the Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR), Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC), Zeta potential confirmed thermal and other stability of nanoparticles and size(22-30nm) and shape (spherical to quasi spherical) confirmed by the Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FE-SEM) and Dynamic Light Scattering (DLS), Their biomedical applications include anti-microbial and antioxidant properties. In anti-microbial four pathogens were tested: two bacteria, Salmonella Typhi (S. typhi) MTCC733 and Escherichia coli (E. coli) MTCC452 and two fungi, Trichoderma reesei (T. reesei) MTCC164 and Aspergillus niger (A. niger) MTCC282.in which a 36.33% against Salmonella typhi in gram-positive bacteria, a high inhibition rate and anti-oxidant, and an IC-50 value greater than 400 µg/ml, suggests only moderate capability in scavenging free radicals when compared to potent standards like ascorbic acid, which demonstrates an IC-50 below 20 µg/ml.